What happens in the donor area?

[Frenchie2001]

OK so my questions is what happens in the donor area if you have a strip cut out. I realize for the first HT there is some extra scalp back there and the "slack" is more or less taken out. Does this raise the hair line in back at all?

 

Also if you have a 2nd or 3rd HT with strip method what happens? Does your scalp stretch in the mean time to allow you to keep cutting pieces out? If this is the case does your whole scalp stretch which then kind of thins the hair at the back of the head?

 

The most important thing is does this change the look of your hair from behind? Do you have to do anything special with the hair back there to cover up the fact that you have had a strip(s) cut out?

 

After reading many posts I do not think this is the case, but I want to be sure. Thanks for the comments.

[Guest]

Frenchie2001:

With only 1-2 transplant sessions you will not alter the posterior hairline. My approach to helping prevent this and the risk of a wide scar is to harvest your first surgery from above the left ear extending to the post midline occipital scalp. The second surgery would then extend from midline post scalp to above the right ear. Third and forth procedures would follow the same approach.

What this does is limits harvesting from the same location too many times, thus decreasing the risks of the problems you bring up. Also the vast majority of patients will never need more than four surgeries.

The scalp stretches between surgeries. Several physicians have shown this in well done studies. So with 1 or 2 harvests from the same area you are unlikely to alter the hairline. The ears never shift, but I do feel you get a very slight elevation of the posterior hairline if you go back to the same area 3 or 4 times. However, most would never notice this shift.

Brad Limmer, MD/jac

 

Dr. Limmer

[Frenchie2001]

Thanks for the reply Doc. Although I must say I had to look up the word occipital in the dictionary.