1500 Grafts FUE Dr. Nadimi in Chicago (First Review)

[Teemo]

Hi everyone,

 

This is probably the very first post reviewing Dr. Nadimi’s work.

 

A little bit about me, I'm currently 24 yo living in the US. I started losing my hair at 21 yo. Before hair loss, I had always had a big forehead with a very thin receded hair line, I was probably at NW2. So I liked to put my hair down to cover my forehead until I turned 20 when the comb over slick back style became very popular. Then I thought my big forehead didn't look as bad.

As if having a big forehead is not enough, my hairline started to recede at 21 yo. It's not common for East Asians to lose hair at this age and no one in my family experience hair loss. My dad, 53 yo, older brother 28 yo, and younger brother 19 yo have great thick hairlines, zero sign of receding or balding. None of my uncles (50 yo +) has severe form of hair loss (NW 2.5 at most). I felt more self-conscious seeing everyone around me with great hair.

 

I had several consultations with different clinics after 1.5 years of research. Most quoted me 1500 graft and I thought this was an appropriate number regarding the current state of my hair loss and age. Some people might think that it's not a good idea to get a HT at 24 yo and I should wait till 30+ but in my opinion, it's ok to start the journey early as long as I have a plan and stay conservative with my hairline. In my case, as mentioned earlier, no one in my family has any severe form of hair loss, and any bald person would get the hairline reconstructed anyways, so why wait and live my 20s feeling sad and unconfident.

 

My plan is to get my hairline reconstructed with 1500~2000 grafts, this should look good for about 3 to 4 years if my hair loss continues, I would get another procedure when I'm about 30. I've been on fin and minoxidil for 8 months hoping to slow down the loss, have no side effects.

 

Initially I was going to choose Dr. Diep, but his schedule didn’t work with mine. So I decided to pick Dr. Nadimi for several reasons. The clinic is close to where I live, thus post op care was more convenient. Also, she was more available, I was able to pick an appropriate date for a procedure. Dr. Nadimi was trained under Dr. Konior, who is top in the industry. Obviously, Dr. Konior wouldn't let unskilled doctors to work in his clinic and ruin his reputation. She was very knowledgeable and reliable during the consultations, answered all my questions very well. I couldn't find any bad results from her on the Internet which was a good sign. People with good results don't usually post anything, they just go on and enjoy their lives, and she's only been in this industry for 3~4 years, those might be the reasons why it was impossible to find a review of her work online. The downside is that she only does 1500 grafts max for FUE procedures because she focuses in quality rather than quantity.

 

Day of Procedure (12/7/2017):

I arrived at the clinic at 6am. We designed the new hairline and agreed to stay conservative as the hairline was lowered by 1.5 ~ 2 cm. I took valium right before the procedure. She shaved the donor area and the frontal portion of my head. Anesthetic injection was the most painful part of the procedure, which lasted for a few minutes. The procedure was done at around 7pm, she got about ~1000 grafts transplanted. I came in the next day and got ~500 grafts transplanted. Surprisingly, I didn’t experience a lot of pain after the procedure, in fact I slept pretty well. There was not much bleeding, both the donor and recipient sites looked very clean right after the procedure, it looked just like those procedures done by Dr. Konior. My donor healed really fast, I didn’t see much scabbing after all, part of the reasons was probably the small punch she used for my procedure. I came to the clinic for cleaning for 4 days, so I didn’t have to take care of the scabbing in the recipient area myself. She put a lot of antibiotic ointment onto my head because I tended to get pimples due to my oily skin. As you guys can see, she did a good job blending transplanted hair into the native hair.

 

Overall, I had a good experience with Dr. Nadimi and the clinic. I’m currently at 5-month post op. I will update my monthly progress in the next posts.

 

Photos:

1, 2, and 3: Pre-op

4: Right after operation (everything looked clean, minimal bleeding, swelling in the forehead)

5 and 6: Day 5 post-op, donor and recipient sites (as you can see she put a layer of antibiotic ointment on my recipient site).

7 and 8: Day 7 post-op, donor and recipient sites

[HairsHoping]

Thanks Teemo. I'd love to see monthly update photos if you have them.

 

Thanks again for taking the time to put this together.

[Melvin- Admin]

Congrats, I'm glad you're posting your experience and I hope you keep us updated with your progress, this thread will be invaluable for those researching Dr. Nadimi, I have also closed the other duplicate thread.

[Teemo]

1-month update: ugly duckling phase, about 95% of the transplanted hair had shed, the native hair grew out. Everything healed fine, there was slight shock loss on the left side of the donor area. I also experienced numbness on the top of my head but it didn't bother me too much. Redness was visible in the front so I used the hair on the top to cover it and I wore a hat most of the time I went out. These side effects were as expected.

[fortuneplant]

Hi Teemo. Love how the post-op looks. Very clean.

 

Looking forward to your final result.

[voxman]

I think this will be quite a good result ~ keep us posted!

[Louisjams]

Looks good so far. Keep us posted!

[Markee]

Looks like a nice job amazingly really can't see any punch marks in your donor area at all ?

What do they charge per graph ?

[Teemo]

3-month post-op:

I skipped the month 2 because it didn't look much different from month 1. At month 3 hair began to sprout!! it looked fine but grew out really fast, less redness as you guys can see. At this point I hadn't got a proper hair cut yet, I wanted the hair in the back to grow out a little bit more. Hair on the top was covering the recipient area pretty well though I still wore hat most of the time.

[Teemo]

Looks like a nice job amazingly really can't see any punch marks in your donor area at all ?

What do they charge per graph ?

 

They charged me $9,800 for 1500 grafts. So $6.5/graft approx.

[Markee]

Do you know what size punch they used?

 

On your day 5 donor picture i can't see any punch marks . Has it gotten to the point where they can use small enough punches that don't leave any noticeable punch mark scars if you where to shave your head ?

[Teemo]

Do you know what size punch they used?

 

On your day 5 donor picture i can't see any punch marks . Has it gotten to the point where they can use small enough punches that don't leave any noticeable punch mark scars if you where to shave your head ?

 

I'm not sure which punch she used for me but she did mention prior the procedure that the punch size is generally between 0.85 to 1.0mm. But size varies from person to person, it depends on your hair characteristic, curlier hair usually requires large punch size. I have straight coarse hair so I think she used smaller punch for me. Beside that my recovery and hair growth were really fast.

[LonelyGraft]

Looks good so far. Does she use manual fue? Do they use an implanter to place grafts or just forceps?

 

Who does the extractions, incisions, and placement?

 

What is included in the total cost? Hotel too?

[Teemo]

Looks good so far. Does she use manual fue? Do they use an implanter to place grafts or just forceps?

 

Who does the extractions, incisions, and placement?

 

What is included in the total cost? Hotel too?

 

Dr. Nadimi did everything, all manual, for the incisions I think a technician was helping her, not sure about the placement though, I was feeling drowsy the whole time cuz of the valium.

 

No the total cost doesn't include hotel. My place to the clinic is 45 mins drive so I didn't need a hotel.

[LonelyGraft]

Dr. Nadimi did everything, all manual, for the incisions I think a technician was helping her, not sure about the placement though, I was feeling drowsy the whole time cuz of the valium.

 

No the total cost doesn't include hotel. My place to the clinic is 45 mins drive so I didn't need a hotel.

 

Thanks. How long did it take for her to design the hairline and what steps were involved? The work looks very clean

[Teemo]

Thanks. How long did it take for her to design the hairline and what steps were involved? The work looks very clean

 

It took about 30 mins for me. She drew the hairline using a marker and asked if I liked it. I went with whatever she suggested to stay conservative.

[Teemo]

4th Month Post-op: Finally I got a haircut!! and more hair growth.

 

Everything was going well at this point. I don't usually wear my hair this short but I wanted the hair to blend with the short hair in the recipient area. The hair stylist didn't notice anything. It looked better than what I expected considering this was just the result after 4 months. All the transplanted hair was growing in the correct direction, evenly distributed. My left side was a bit thinner than the right side, I kinda expected this because it has always been like this even before the procedure. Redness was not visible, still a bit numb on the top of my head, but definitely getting better, and it didn't really bother me.

[Riddler89]

Any more updates or is this up to date?

[Teemo]

I let my hair grow out because it looks fuller when it's longer. The hairline is definitely thickening up, the right side is doing better. Numbness is almost gone. At this point I started to experience dandruff on my hairline so I just got back to using Nizoral 2 weeks ago hopefully the situation improves. So far, I'm really happy with this result, the new hairline looks even better than what I used to have before hair loss.

[Teemo]

A closer look of the thickening hairline.

[LonelyGraft]

Wow this is looking great

 

How long before surgery did u have to stop minox?

How long after did u start back up?

 

When you say she only does 1500 fue is that per day or she limits that total number for each surgery?

 

Thanks man

[Markee]

Nice job looking GQ now

[Sean]

Wow, thats looks amazing. Dr Nadimi did an excellent job. So natural and it doesnt even give a tell tale sign that any surgery took place. It isnt see through. It is clearly a top notch result. Manual + fue clearly looks like a safer approach versus motorized, or robotic, or suction based options. I personally am thinking it is safer for most hair types to go manual versus the heat and torsion from other devices. Yield is phenomenal. Some folks wish they had it this way in the first place. Your doctor definitely did not let you down and clearly performed this procedure with a great safe surgical protocol. Congrats!

[24needmore]

Clean design, looks great! Going to be fantastic result.

 

Side question:

 

Did you go in wanting to have a procedure with Dr. Konior and then were given an opportunity were Dr. Nadimi? I am researching both but leaning more towards Dr. Konior but he is very persistent that he is unavailable for 1+ years and not really taking patients. I'm still planning for having one 1-2 years out but I'm not sure I understand why he wouldn't be accepting new ones especially when next year comes around, who is he going to serve?

[lakes9925]

any update on this?