My recent FUE experience with Dr. Rahal

[MYFUE2010]

I first noticed thinning in my hair when I was 18. Like any other hair loss sufferer I was shocked and had a hard time believing that my thick curly hair was thinning. I went to a doctor for my hair loss and he told me that my thinning was mild and there was no need to be alarmed. He put me on Finasteride which I took for 6 months or so, but then I felt like I was still losing the same number of hairs daily so I assumed it wasn't working for me. I switched to rogain 5% after finasteride and had a feeling it was working so I continued to apply it once a day until only a month ago.

I had a lot of hair when I first noticed my hairloss and as a result, I never took it as seriously as I should have. Sometimes I think I should have stuck with Finasteride and saved more of my hair over the years. But it was a prostate pill and to be honest I did not feel comfortable taking it for long term. That's why I stuck with rogaine that was topical with little systematic absorption. I also used nizoral shampoo on and off over the years.

My hairline continued to recede very slowly from 18 to 23-24. I went from Nw1 to Nw2 over the course of 5 to 6 years. And it was at that time when I started disliking my new hairline. I decided to get more serious about treating my hairloss so I applied rogaine more religiously and even doubled the daily dose and started applying it both in the morning and at night. I also washed my hair with Nizoral shampoo twice a week. I felt like rogaine alone was not helping enough so I went back on Finasteride this last summer (2010). I knew there was a high chance that even the combination of Finasteride and Rogaine wont take me back to Nw1 as they're not very efficient for treating hairline. That's why I started looking into surgical hair restoration to improve my hairline.

I started researching hair transplants online by reading hair loss forums and such. i knew that the best thing to do is to stay on medications and have a surgery when I am older and my hair loss pattern is more clear. But, and this was a very important But to me. I wanted to have a decent hair while I was still young. Waiting till I am 35 or 40 didn't seem like a wise thing to do for me as I may not even care about my hair at that age so much that I want to go through with a hair transplant. But in the meantime progression of hair loss in an issue that cannot be overlooked when considering a hair transplant.

So I sat down and started making a plan. I looked at my family's hair loss history as well as my current status and age. My dad has a full head of hair at 52 with some general thinning on the top but still has the full head of hair look without question. The baldest person in my immediate family is my uncle who is a Nw4 at 46 years of age. So in my plan I assumed that I will be like my baldest uncle a Nw4. That still seemed promising and I figured if I stay on medication It seems quite reasonable to get a Nw1 hairline by a small hair transplant at 26 (my age right now). Especially since my hair has been the same in the past three years so I believe it has stabilized to a good degree.

After finalizing my hair restoration plan, I decided to find a very reputable surgeon that can give me the best results I can get. Of course location and fees were also important to me as I am still in school and could not afford just any fee. In my quest for finding an excellent hair transplant surgeon I came across this website "the hair transplant network" and checked out the surgeons closest to my location. After much research and carefully reviewing online forums and hair transplant blogs I came to the conclusion that Dr. Rahal in Ottawa is the best option for me considering many factors including: fees, location, expertise in creating very natural looking hairlines, reputation, ethics, professionalism and etc.

I booked an appointment with Dr. Rahal and met with him on November 19th, 2010. He examined my hair and initially said to me that I was on medication and did not really need a surgical restoration yet as I did not have any bald spots or anything. But then I told him about how my receded hairline is bothering me and that I wish to restore my hairline to some degree but do not want to get too aggressive. Dr. Rahal suggested that he can restore some of the recession by in a small procedure of 700 grafts. I also let him know that I wanted to go with FUE technique and asked him a few questions about the FUE yield compared with FUT. Dr. Rahal answered all my questions and told me that I had ideal hair and skin characteristics for the procedure and that he is capable of performing a FUE procedure on me with a very high yield. Dr. Rahal was very confident about his abilities and that was quite reassuring especially because I knew he was a world class surgeon who consistently produced some of the best hair transplant results in the world. So I felt comfortable booking a date for my FUE surgery with Dr. Rahal.

I booked Dec 22nd, 2010 for my FUE procedure with Dr. Rahal. I followed Dr. Rahals pre-op instructions: stopped using rogaine, stopped taking vitamin E, stopped drinking alcohol. I also did some blood work that Dr. Rahal had asked for.

A month went by really fast and in no time it was surgery time. I went to Dr. Rahal's office in the morning of December 22nd. I was greeted by Dr. Rahal's receptionist, Tara, and was given some forms and consent papers that I needed to sign. I went over the forms for the next hour or so and I met Dr. Rahal when I was done with the papers. Dr. Rahal reviewed what we had agreed on during the consultation and started designing a hairline for me. We made a few small changes and I let Dr. Rahal know that I was concerned about the final hairline being see through so that Dr. Rahal could take that into account when designing my hairline. He then finalized the hairline design and showed it to me to know my opinion. I felt happy with the design and decided to trust Dr. Rahal's expertise more than my own personal opinion. We agreed on about 1000 FUE grafts to restore my hairline. After the hairline design was over Dr. Rahal introduced me to Mike one of his technicians, we took some pre-op photos of the designed hairline and then Mike started shaving my doner and recipient areas where Dr. Rahal had marked. Dr. Rahal had picked areas in my doner that were softer and more straight which was exactly what I wanted. To me that was another indication that Dr. Rahal was doing all the right things.

Next was setting me up in the operation room and giving me some pain killers and an injection. I was a little nervous at first which is normal but soon I got relaxed. Mike was really nice and made sure I was ok throughout the preparation process. Same were the other techs. They often asked me if was feeling well or needed anything which was really comforting.

I was all ready for the surgery by 12 pm and Dr. Rahal started freezing my scalp. The injections were painful but the good news was that I didn't feel any pain a few minutes after the injections. Dr. Rahal then started extracting the grafts. He was really excited by how my hairs responded to the extraction. He liked the extraction process so much that he video taped some of the process. It took him 2 hours or so to extract around 1000 grafts. It really didn't feel like two hours though as it went by quite fast. We had a lunch break after the extraction was over. After the break Dr. Rahal made the incisions which again went by really fast. Dr. Rahal then decided to extracted some more grafts and we went for another round of extraction. We totaled 1238 grafts with the following break down:

Singles-312

Doubles-573

Triples-344

Quad-9

Planting the grafts was the last step. Three technicians were involved; one planting the left side, one planting the right side and one supplying the grafts to them. The planting step was the longest I would say. I was just sitting still and waiting for my new hairs to be planted. I needed some more freezing a couple of times during the planting which Dr. Rahal took care of. Planting the grafts was done by about 6:30 or 7pm for a total surgery time of 6.5 to 7 hours. I was then cleaned and bandaged and a surgical cap was put on my head. Mike gave me the medications that I needed to take and explained how and when to take them. I was really happy to be done. Dr. Rahal then drove me to the foxbar guest house which is a guest house exclusively for Dr. Rahal patients.

I had some pain later at night mostly in the recipient area. But After taking a few pain killers everything was under control and I managed to get some good sleep. The pain was mostly gone the next day and I didn't even take any pain killers. I went to Dr. Rahal's office for cleaning and my first follow up. Dr. Rahal inspected the recipient area and said that everything looked good. Mike cleaned the doner and recipient areas and explained to me how to do it myself at home. Dr. Rahal gave me an appointment for a second follow up in a few weeks and I was all good to go home.

 

 

I am currently 2 weeks post-op and healing really well. If you would like to follow my progress please check out my blog on the hair transplant network at the following URL:

 

 

http://www.hairtransplantnetwork.com/blog/home-page.asp?WebID=1925

 

 

I hope you potential patients, especially younger guys my age find the details and info I provided here useful. Please feel free to message me if you had any questions.

 

 

Thank you for reading.

[Sean]

Nice write up. Thanks for sharing. I am also getting FUE done with Dr. Rahal later this year and really looking forward to it. I am getting more than double the grafts you got. Your procedure photos look great. Hope it turns out great. Keep us updated with the progress. Looks like great work. How is foxbar?

[mattj]

Hi MYFUE,

 

I always like reading the write-ups. Thanks for that.

 

It's always amazing to see how quickly a donor area can recover from FUE extractions.

When I have spoken to Dr Rahal about FUE I detect real enthusiasm about how he enjoys getting into the rhythm of extracting the grafts. It has occured to me that this enjoyment in performing the tricky procedure could make an actual difference when it comes to achieving a good result. I'm sure it must play a part in Dr Rahal's confidence too.

 

Good growth to you, and I reckon you'll have a great result to enjoy later this year.

Edited January 7, 2011 by mattj

[Montreal]

after 1000 grafts,why did he decide to go for 238 more and did he charged you for the extras ones?

[Shadow of the EMpire State]

i knew that the best thing to do is to stay on medications and have a surgery when I am older and my hair loss pattern is more clear. But to me. I wanted to have a decent hair while I was still young. Waiting till I am 35 or 40 didn't seem like a wise thing to do for me as I may not even care about my hair at that age so much that I want to go through with a hair transplant.

 

Luckily, you chose a top-end surgeon. But the idea that you won't care about your hair when you're 35 is very naive. Let me tell you something: only the body ages. Everything else stays the same. If you think that lightning will strike at 30 or 35 and suddenly transform you into a fat dad who doesn't care about his hair, you're kidding yourself. In all likelihood, you'll be as concerned then as you are now.

 

 

[chrisdav]

I am a bit intrigued, why wouldn't you care about your hair/hairline at 35 to 40? Picked a good surgeon , Dr Rahal is very good.

Edited October 26, 2011 by chrisdav

[widowpeaking]

I'm with you buddy, I would rather have a great hairline and enjoy it in my twenties and then shave it when I'm older than have a kind of meh hairline all my life.

[chrisdav]

A lot of males look great in the 30's 40's and even 50's ( a lot will argue this is their peak in a male looks wise), so to go with really dense, square, broad lego man hairline in your 20s and find that your hair deteriorates with mid scalp recession/thinning and equally crown recession/thinning, you will firstly leave yourself looking stupid and unless cloning donor hair becomes a reality, you will not have enough hair to address the problem.

 

I can understand where you are coming from as i originally thought like that when i was younger but you can't predict future hair loss.

[widowpeaking]

Please allow me to be blunt and use an example to clarify my point. I would like to date 20 year olds while I am still in my early twenties. Looking 30 because of my super high temples does not help. Perhaps I am naive, but I remain optimistic that with age, people begin to care more about important qualities such as kindness, passion, and loyalty, rather than number of hair you have. Meanwhile, I want to have the hair appropriate for my age, I'll have plenty of opportunity to look old in the future. I understand when older guys with severe hair loss laugh at my N2/N3 and tell me that it's fine. Yes, it's fine when the majority of people become that way when they are 30, not when they are 18. Having said that, I want to keep a donor reserve for the future, but I have a feeling most people advising against HT at early age did not have people at their college parties asking what this old guy is doing here. Besides I thought you could go on Finasteride to keep your existing hair if the future hairloss is a big concern?

Edited October 28, 2011 by widowpeaking

[chrisdav]

I agree with you and fully understand where you are coming from, i am 26 and had a repair hair transplant 10 days ago to address my hairline.

 

Your 20's can be the best time of your life and as you only live once, need to live life to the fullest, and have no regrets.

 

It is all relative to the individual, so i fully understand. I tryed sorting my hair line out when i was 22 but unfortunately seen very poor surgeon/s in the uk, and now at 26, have had surgery with Dr Feller last week.

 

All i am saying is that for example, you can still date/marry 20 year old girls in your 30's 40's even 50's lol haha

[widowpeaking]

Oh goodness no, I can barely tolerate them now! The main reason I want to date young girls is that I don't have regrets about missing out in the future, most of them are shallow and immature. Yes, not all of them, and maybe I'm just unlucky, but it's been very hard to find the good ones, so instead of crying about how the world is unfair I just work with what I have.

[chrisdav]

I understand where you are coming from? Are you on any medication?

[widowpeaking]

No, my biggest concern right now is Propecia side effects and if it would interfere with my athletic performance. The good news is that the recession has stopped over a year ago, so my next course of action is to see a respectable doctor (we have a couple good ones here in Canada) and check if there is any miniaturization. My hair has always been fine, so I am not sure if I am even a candidate.

 

The PM seems to be broken for me, but I would be interested to see an update on your HT.

[chrisdav]

You have some of the best doctors in the world in Canada( Rahal, Hasson&wong, Simons, others on here) so you will be fine in that respect.

 

How do you think it would interfere with your athletic performance? I was of a very high level athletics and football in my younger years, so i am just curious.

 

If you meet surgeon/s and you decide to go through with hair transplant surgery, its likely they will advise you in the consultation to go on finasteride, however, I could be wrong.

 

I am not an surgeon or an expert but i have a better understanding then when i was younger

[Shadow of the EMpire State]

Please allow me to be blunt and use an example to clarify my point. I would like to date 20 year olds while I am still in my early twenties. Looking 30 because of my super high temples does not help.

 

Whether you get women really has very little to do with your hair. The men who think that baldness prevents them from getting women are the ones who never got many women in the first place. They judge women on looks, so they assume that women feel the same way about men. Only they don't. Women respond to game, not what your hair looks like. Men with no game think that they didn't get the girl because they weren't handsome enough when, in reality, that usually has nothing to do with it. You want to talk about dating 20-year-old women? Right now, at my local bar, we have a 37-year-old scumbag who comes in. Total loser. Criminal record, been in a motorcycle gang, etc. Well, he's got a shaved head with an extreme NW3-4 dracula hairline. Plus, he's short! Well, two weeks ago, I found out he's banging a 21-year-old waitress who works there. The rest of the guys and I sat on our asses watching the clock go around while we stared at this girl's ass. But this guy actually went up to her. And that's why he got her. You could have Brad Pitt hair, but if you're not approaching women with game, you won't get them.

[jessie1]

Shadow,

 

Hilarious mate. Love how you put that together.

 

I'm bloody giggling like a school kid........

 

On a serious note, point well made.

 

Jessie

[widowpeaking]

I have no problems with women mate, like I said was just using it as an example that I think guys can relate to. Every little bit adds up though. Is hair a deal breaker - no, does it help - yes, and I'm not trying to pick up simple waitresses either (not that there is anything wrong with waitressing, just saying, wouldn't want the type of girl that goes for guys like that). I have other reasons why I am considering changing my look as well, I need to look younger for something. Out of curiosity, what would be your reasons?

[SugarHighs]

No, my biggest concern right now is Propecia side effects and if it would interfere with my athletic performance. The good news is that the recession has stopped over a year ago, so my next course of action is to see a respectable doctor (we have a couple good ones here in Canada) and check if there is any miniaturization. My hair has always been fine, so I am not sure if I am even a candidate.

 

The PM seems to be broken for me, but I would be interested to see an update on your HT.

 

I played semi-pro sports throughout my 20's including time I was off, then on Propecia. It had no impact on my performance whatsoever that I am aware.

[Shadow of the EMpire State]

I have no problems with women mate, like I said was just using it as an example that I think guys can relate to. Every little bit adds up though. Is hair a deal breaker - no, does it help - yes, and I'm not trying to pick up simple waitresses either (not that there is anything wrong with waitressing, just saying, wouldn't want the type of girl that goes for guys like that). I have other reasons why I am considering changing my look as well, I need to look younger for something. Out of curiosity, what would be your reasons?

 

To look younger, to look better for my own satisfaction and amusement. General narcissism.

[SugarHighs]

Whether you get women really has very little to do with your hair. The men who think that baldness prevents them from getting women are the ones who never got many women in the first place. They judge women on looks, so they assume that women feel the same way about men. Only they don't. Women respond to game, not what your hair looks like. Men with no game think that they didn't get the girl because they weren't handsome enough when, in reality, that usually has nothing to do with it. You want to talk about dating 20-year-old women? Right now, at my local bar, we have a 37-year-old scumbag who comes in. Total loser. Criminal record, been in a motorcycle gang, etc. Well, he's got a shaved head with an extreme NW3-4 dracula hairline. Plus, he's short! Well, two weeks ago, I found out he's banging a 21-year-old waitress who works there. The rest of the guys and I sat on our asses watching the clock go around while we stared at this girl's ass. But this guy actually went up to her. And that's why he got her. You could have Brad Pitt hair, but if you're not approaching women with game, you won't get them.

 

I agree with this to a point, but I would say it reads somewhat like it was copied off the front page of the "Attraction Forums," rather than something that was gathered from personal life experience. If I am wrong, forgive me, and you're free to call me an ass.

 

I just hope by "because they weren't handsome enough" you mean that looks aren't everything for men. I agree. I hope you are not suggesting that looks don't matter at all, or that your appearance does not matter - that would be a ludicrous statement.

 

Your ugly short 37 yo biker sounds like he has an attractive stereotype (bikers/thugs are obviously attractive to some women), and probably knows how to push her submissive buttons. While he is not genetically good-looking, he's physically attractive in other ways (I don't want to speculate too much, haven't seen the guy in action.)

 

The Brad Pitt part I think may be a little misleading - if you had only Brad's hair you wouldn't necessarily meet any women, because you might not be that good looking - but if you actually *looked* like Brad, you would still meet women, because they would approach you.

[zenmunk]

Been quite awhile. I'll take a shot in the dark and ask the OP if he has any updates he'd mind sharing? Thanks.

[Veritas84]

I'm considering Dr. Rahal for treating my condition, too.

[mattj]

MYFUE2010 is actually this patient whose result we posted back in October.

 

http://www.hairrestorationnetwork.com/eve/163577-dr-rahal-1238-fue-grafts-6-months.html

 

Some people just don't come back to the forums. I'll post photos on his behalf (a few more at link).

 

 

[zenmunk]

Thanks for the update, mattj. 6 month results are outstanding! Dr. Rahal really has a knack for creating soft and natural hairlines. The fact that he did it on a patient with wavy, coarser hair is quite impressive. Of course, this patient is very lucky as his physiology clearly cooperated.

 

I've read that Dr. Rahal comes to NYC from time-to-time for consultations. Is he planning another trip to the Big Apple anytime soon?

[mattj]

Thanks for the update, mattj. 6 month results are outstanding! Dr. Rahal really has a knack for creating soft and natural hairlines. The fact that he did it on a patient with wavy, coarser hair is quite impressive. Of course, this patient is very lucky as his physiology clearly cooperated.

 

I've read that Dr. Rahal comes to NYC from time-to-time for consultations. Is he planning another trip to the Big Apple anytime soon?

 

zenmunk, you must've missed the thread!

 

http://www.hairrestorationnetwork.com/eve/165226-dr-rahal-new-york-city-may-3rd-4th.html

 

May 3rd and 4th. I advise you to contact the office quickly via phone or email (see thread for contact details) as there won't be many slots left. I've contacted Tara in the office to find out what times are available and will shoot you a PM later to hopefully alert you.