Long procedure

[teethrus]

I have a question on how procedure time can affect transplant success.

 

I had a transplant done about 3 months ago (my 3rd procedure) and it went a bit differently than what I experienced before. The last procedure was done in Colorado at an office that only used 1 technician. I had 2000 grafts done and it took the tech about 4 - 5 hours to disect all the follicles with the entire procedure, start to finish, taking about 9 hours.

 

My previous procedures were 1000 and 900 grafts and only took about 4 hours total for each so I am wondering what the effect of the prolonged disection time will be on my success.

 

How long can follicles remain alive after they have been removed? Has anyone else had similar durations for a procedure of that size?

 

I'm only 3 months post-op so too early for me to report on success but based on my previous experiences, I am expecting growth to start in about a month and continue to increase until about 11 months. Hoping my follicles are strong enough to withstand 6 hours out of my scalp!!!

[stamos]

I have seen successful transplants, with the procedure lasting more than 12 hours, so you don't have to worry about that. Why you went in surgery two times for 1000 & 900 grafts and not transplant 1900 grafts in one procedure?

[RCWest]

I have read in several places that they are fine up to 8 hours out of the body. After that, the average death rate is supposedly 1% per hour. That is info from Balding Blog.

[Dr. William Lindsey]

At our office time of the case is related to 1. manpower 2. dark hair/light skin or light-gray hair/ light skin and 3. curly vs straight roots.

 

Meaning that in general we can do 3500 grafts starting promptly at 8am and we are all out by 5pm. Occasionally a cutter is sick or out for some reason and things may take an extra 45 minutes or so....but with sufficient manpower even larger cases shouldn't take forever.

 

With light hair roots and light skin, the cutters take longer so as to preserve every root...so with gray hair or blondes, we add an hour to the guestimate.

 

And finally with curly hair...ie black guys, we figure an extra hour just to get the follicular units out cleanly and without alot of extra tissue. Its often like cleaning off a corkscrew. Contrast that to a Korean....where the techs say its almost like cutting the teeth off of a comb..super easy.

 

Nevertheless, our longest case started at 8 and ended at 630pm, counting a half hour lunch break. In addition to graft survival, after too long I start to worry that the patient just wants out of the chair, and can't hold still. There comes a time of diminishing returns after too long of a case.

 

Dr. Lindsey McLean VA

[teethrus]

I have seen successful transplants, with the procedure lasting more than 12 hours, so you don't have to worry about that. Why you went in surgery two times for 1000 & 900 grafts and not transplant 1900 grafts in one procedure?

 

Thanks for all your answers guys...helps to put my mind at ease!

 

Stamos, in answer to your question about why I had 1000 & then 900 grafts done rather than just a bigger procedure. When I had my 1st procedure done (at 30 y/o) I still had a relatively thick head of hair but my typical U shaped thinning pattern was becoming evident. The goal was to begin reinforcing my hairline and filling in the whole mid-scalp area before I got REALLY thin. I went back for the additional 900 about a year later to tweek the shape of my hairline after I could see the result of the 1st surgery. My most recent procedure of 2000 grafts (at 35 y/o) was to get an overall "fill in" from my mid-scalp forward to increase my thickness in areas where I had additional thinning. I suppose I could have waited and just gotten 4000 grafts done all at once but I guess I'm just too vain to let my hair get that thin!