Will there ever be a permanent solution ... ?

[anonymous man]

I am starting to think we will never see a true solution.

 

Its just something that eludes science. We just keep being fed little bits of vague hope ... for the past 10 years a solution has been '3 or 4 years off' ....

 

I keep thinking, they have found the cause of the problem, DHT or whatever - cant they come up with a sure fire pill, one pill that goes BLAM and kills that sh*t inside you?

 

Or some form of freeze method - if someone said to me today 'I can freeze your hair as is, it will never grow again, never fall out again, it will just be welded into your scalp, your original hair, like a rock' I would do it straight away. When I think about it, that sounds something like a HT

 

Some sort of magic potion, like that Looney Tunes episode where Bugs Bunny pours hair growth formula mixed with fertilizer on Elmer Fudds head - and he grows dandelions on his head. Or the Married with Children episode where Kelly makes Al Bundys hair grow really long due to some radioactive concoction she produces.

 

It seems so simple really - you know the cause, now find the thing that kills that cause.

 

Looks like the big shave is the only sure fire way to eliminate the problem.

 

How depressing that this section of the forum is also the smallest

[jackisback1]

One thing is on our side, however. Profit motive. I just saw an interesting 20/20 with John Stossel on YouTube about the health care industry. Here is the relevant part 6.

 

[url=http://youtube.com/watch?v=E_KCLm9cekU&feature=related]http://youtube.com/watch?v=E_KCLm9cekU&feature=related

 

According to them, the procedures that are not covered by insurance are where patients expect the most bang for their buck. Like Henry Ford and the Model-T, that is where theoretically the most innovation should be, and in practice this has applied to some cosmetic procedures, and Lasik eye surgery stands out as one of the most improved and cost dropping procedures. They say that in this time Lasik procedures improved from this competition, it didn't run stagnant.

 

It's hard to know exactly how universal healthcare might be implemented in the United States, but in many countries the government sets the price for many surgeries. Obviously, HTs would not apply, so this could be an advantage for those who wish to profit off of us, and for us if we are willing to pay. (although possibly bad for others, if you believe the arguments against universal healthcare).

 

I think that if there is a way to practically cure this (obviously a bigger IF than we may have believed a decade ago), then it should be found within the next 15 years (assuming universal healthcare in '08), because for every girl willing to spend $20,000 to fix herself up, there's gotta be a guy willing to spend $40,000 to get back the hair he had at 18. Hell, I'd drive a truck in Iraq for a year if I could get that back, and retain it. But then again, is there anybody here that gives a damn if they have a full head of hair in 15 years if they don't between now and then?

[dabuski]

Im pretty sure there is a cure out there some place.

Its just a matter of time.

Of course the problem with this is only time knows when it will happen.

[anonymous man]

Originally posted by jackisback:

One thing is on our side, however. Profit motive. I just saw an interesting 20/20 with John Stossel on YouTube about the health care industry. Here is the relevant part 6.

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=E_KCLm9cekU&feature=related

 

According to them, the procedures that are not covered by insurance are where patients expect the most bang for their buck. Like Henry Ford and the Model-T, that is where theoretically the most innovation should be, and in practice this has applied to some cosmetic procedures, and Lasik eye surgery stands out as one of the most improved and cost dropping procedures. They say that in this time Lasik procedures improved from this competition, it didn't run stagnant.

 

It's hard to know exactly how universal healthcare might be implemented in the United States, but in many countries the government sets the price for many surgeries. Obviously, HTs would not apply, so this could be an advantage for those who wish to profit off of us, and for us if we are willing to pay. (although possibly bad for others, if you believe the arguments against universal healthcare).

 

I think that if there is a way to practically cure this (obviously a bigger IF than we may have believed a decade ago), then it should be found within the next 15 years (assuming universal healthcare in '08), because for every girl willing to spend $20,000 to fix herself up, there's gotta be a guy willing to spend $40,000 to get back the hair he had at 18. Hell, I'd drive a truck in Iraq for a year if I could get that back, and retain it. But then again, is there anybody here that gives a damn if they have a full head of hair in 15 years if they don't between now and then?

 

You are right ... if I was to have no hair for the next 15 years, I dont think I would be pumped up to get it all back ... but in saying that, so many in the HT photo section are older gents etc - so I am sure our vanity / desire to look good stays with us forever .... which I think is a good thing ....

 

 

 

Now about that truck in Iraq you say ...??

[leonardonw1]

But then again, is there anybody here that gives a damn if they have a full head of hair in 15 years if they don't between now and then?

 

I am not sure how far off we are from getting close to hair cloning(They keep saying its off by another couple of years or so) but I reckon that the only relevant cure we can find would be in some form of gene therapy which I believe would only be plausible by 2050 or something!....but hey you never know anything is possible.Now if only if they could invent time travel and make it available for the common man:P

[NorwoodScale]

I know nothing about science. But I'd be interested in knowing how DHT actually binds to the hair follicle's androgen receptor or whatever. Is it through some kind of chemical? In what process does it bind to the follicle? What if we were simply to disrupt the process in which it binds to the receptor? Then we wouldn't lose anymore hair.

[mahhong]

Cure is a difficult word to define (even if it doesn't seem that way at first).

 

What constitutes a cure? A pill you can take to reverse hair loss? A combination of therapies/surgery/drugs to deal with hair loss and gain a new head of hair? Or is it removing the 'hair loss' gene altogether from the pool?

 

I think a single, easily definable 'cure' is probably a long way off. The idea of being able to take a pill or just go get an injection or something is probably one step too far for at least the next decade and likely a fair while further than that.

 

But a successful combination of therapies/procedures to reverse hair loss and gain new hair is probably very close. Already propecia/minoxidil and HTs can provide staggering results for even the worst baldness. In addition to that there are a plethora of new treatments and approaches in various stages of testing; everything from follicle neogenesis through to perhaps healing HT donor areas to regrow follicles, cell therapy and much more.

 

I think we're well on our way to being able to cure the effects of hair loss and gain a new head of almost full density hair, but I think this 'cure' will be a combination of different approaches; something of a Frankenstein's school of medicine. But already the results we see every day are incredible and getting better at a near enough exponential rate.

 

But, to put things in a realistic context, the 'magic bullet' for hair loss is probably not around the corner. Our generation and possibly even the one after it will have to work with a combination of approaches to achieve our results; but I think in 5-10 years the results you will be able to get will be nothing short of cosmetically fantastic, so have hope! We're a long way off making hair loss a 'thing of the past', but we're right around the corner from making hair loss a truly beatable problem.

[FinHairLoss]

They found a cure..... it should be ready to go in asia be 2013. Google "histogen bald truth interview april 2010" you should find an audio interview and article

[aw33]

All a bunch of crap...maybe in 2030 or 2050.

[angelina]

Finasteride (Generic Propecia) controls hair loss by controlling the action of the enzyme alpha type II reductase. Finasteride restricts the production of dihydrotestosterone and also asserts the level of it low, which stops the hair loss and promotes hair regrowth.

[Davis]

First off until very recently, I want to say the last couple of months?

is when scientists identified the baldness gene.

We had no idea what had caused baldness until that point. DHT is part of the equation however it is not the root cause.

 

That is where the problem has been all this time.

You cannot solve a problem when you do not understand what the source of that problem is.

 

Now that we know where the root cause is scientists can start working on a solution.

Until now it has either been a band aide approach or a shot in the dark.

 

Lets not kid ourselves. HL drugs, HT's etc are all just band aide approaches, not a true cure.

 

unfortunately time is all it will take now