What is the open technique of donor harvesting?

[RCWest]

I was on Dr. Path's site and saw this. How does this differ from regular strip harvesting?

[wb280]

Hi RC. just to chip in on your enquiry. If i m not wrong, the open technique works like this. When the strip is being cut, the doc would just extract a long thin strip from ear to ear. This is standard. However, as we all know, since we are suitable HT candidates, it means that we have good and sufficient donor hair. If the doc wants to cut short the time, he would just cut blindly and in the process, destroy some good potential donor hair. This is what they call the transection rate. Doc Pat uses the open technique, meaning, with the help of another assistant doc, he would go around the line, rather than a straight line. Its like kayaking in a swamp. As such, you avoid transecting potential donors. Down side is that the work is very tedious. Also, there is no need to worry on getting a crooked line as its not visible to the naked eye.

 

The transection rate with such a technique results in transection in less than 2%. I remembered that for my surgery, after doc Pat finished cutting the strip, he told me he was very happy that the transection was extremely low and very few grafts were lost. He took more than one hour to cut!

 

Thats wat i know about the open techique. Others are welcome to edit or add to my explanation

 

Hope that helps!

Edited August 18, 2010 by wb280

[Dr. Glenn Charles]

I agree and thought that the open technique referred to a method of carefully removing the donor strip. There are other names for this type of donor harvesting. I also use a very slow and calculated method for removing the donor strip that takes a long time, but have not given it a special name.

[wb280]

Thanks for chipping in Dr Charles! One suggestion, u can name it the Glenn Charles technique and patent it!

 

Jokes aside, i have been following your work doc. All the results seem impressive!

 

Thanks again for spending the time in responding!