FUE Donor Shock Loss (4 months Post Op.)

[timemachineplz]

Greetings to all,

I'm new to these forums although I've been ghosting for quite some time. I'm experiencing FUE donor shock loss and have been since my surgery 4 months ago. I had about 2200 grafts extracted, but there is still an overall patchiness/thinning throughout the back of my head. Currently, I have cut my hair down to 3 weeks length. (I'll post pics at a later date)

 

I've read the forums and many have said that shock loss usually recovers fully in about 3-4 months time. Since I'm at that 4 month mark, you can imagine that I'm a bit discouraged.

 

Of course, the 3-4 month timeframe is simply a general rule, but I was hoping I'd fall in that rule lol. Now, I have to level with you all. I haven't applied any minoxidil to the back of my head throughout this entire process since I've been afraid of any initial shedding that might come with it. If I continue on this path, will the hairs in the back of my head ever return? I've been under the impression that the hairs eventually return but minoxidil simply speeds up the process. Is this incorrect?

 

Any assistance by anyone is greatly appreciated. Thx!

[Janna]

An fue patient can experience shockloss at various stages not just right after surgery. I've known patients to experience donor schock at 6-7 months after surgery. It's another 3 months after the shock loss that they regrow. They will eventually grow back. I'm assuming that you didn't lose your donor hairs right away.

[timemachineplz]

Thanks for responding Janna.

 

After my surgery was done, I noticed that I was missing a considerable amount of hair in my donor area. At about 2 weeks post op, I sent pictures of my donor area to my doctor and he told me that it was shock loss. However haven't seen any improvement at the 4 month mark. Sure when my hair gets to 4 weeks growth its not really noticeable, but I was under the impression that all of the hairs in the donor area that have experienced shock loss would return. Am I off base here?

[joejohns]

Hi Janna, can you elaborate more on patients who had shock loss 3-4 months postop? is it common? My issue is that I had FUE in Feb 2013 and a followup surgery in September 2013. I was using 2% minox after both. In November begining I started using Reogaine 5% foam and till about Dec 20th or so things were going great. Now all of sudden since then (till today) I am having a deadly shed. Shedding is in fact more acute in donor areas and sides. I lose 100 hairs or so when I comb in the morning and I comb only once a day out of fear. I stopped the rogaine 5% cold turkey and after 10 days or so since yesterday started back on 2% once in 2 days. Kindly shed some light on other cases you might have seen, I am scared out of my mind.

 

 

An fue patient can experience shockloss at various stages not just right after surgery. I've known patients to experience donor schock at 6-7 months after surgery. It's another 3 months after the shock loss that they regrow. They will eventually grow back. I'm assuming that you didn't lose your donor hairs right away.