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Upcoming FUT with Dr. Bloxham


Bad Hair

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Hi, folks.

I'm a 60 yr old male who's had multiple hair transplants ( HT ), with 4 different doctors. My first HT was in 1984 when the technology was in the Stone Age compared to today. As a result, some of my surgeries have been as much about remediation of large, poorly- placed plugs, transected grafts, etc, as it's been about trying to add new hair. My last HT was in 2013 with Dr. Feller. It was my first HT with him, and by far the best. He's outstanding. But now Feller has cut back on the number of surgeries he's doing. This is likely my LAST hair transplant since I have very little donor left, so i really wanted to make the right choice for a surgeon. After considering going many different surgeons my gut told me to return to Feller Bloxham. I'm going to do my HT on April 30th with Dr. Blake Bloxham, Feller's partner at Feller Bloxham Hair. I met with Dr. Bloxham last fall was greatly impressed with his professionalism, knowledge, and empathy for my situation. He estimates that he can do another FUT of ~ 1200 grafts from my remaining donor area. I'm confident Dr. Bloxham and his staff will do an outstanding job, and am really looking to the procedure. 

I realize ~1200 grafts is nothing these days, but that's about all I have left for a strip. All the previous HT's have left me with very little donor area.  I'll post some pictures when I get a chance. This is likely my LAST HT since I have very little donor left. Now, I have only the left side of my head ( above my ear and running towards the back of my head ) available for a donor strip. I have thinning in the middle of my scalp that runs from front to back. Dr. Bloxham's goal is to provide density to the middle front, as well as provide more density to the thinning middle that goes to back to my crown. My crown area has the thinnest coverage. I've been told many times that the front area is much easier to get better results. Dr. Bloxham plans to go from front to back until the grafts run out. My plan after this last HT is to try SMP to address the remaining lack of coverage/density that might exist. So my game plan consists of a combination of a final HT and then SMP?  Have other people been in this same situation? 

Thanks for letting me know. 

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@Bad Hair

Wishing you the best of luck with your upcoming procedure. Not long to wait now.

Would you consider beard hair vía FUE into you crown to add density in the future? 

Patient Advisor for Dr. Bisanga - BHR Clinic 

ian@bhrclinic.com   -    BHR YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcH4PY1OxoYFwSDKzAkZRww

I am not a medical professional and my words should not be taken as medical advice. All opinions and views shared are my own.

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You chose an excellent surgeon. I look forward to seeing your progress. Thanks for sharing 😃

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I’m a paid admin for Hair Transplant Network. I do not receive any compensation from any clinic. My comments are not medical advice.

Check out my final hair transplant and topical dutasteride journey

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Melvin- Managing Publisher and Forum Moderator for the Hair Transplant Network, the Coalition Hair Loss Learning Center, and the Hair Loss Q&A Blog.

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10 hours ago, Raphael84 said:

@Bad Hair

Wishing you the best of luck with your upcoming procedure. Not long to wait now.

Would you consider beard hair vía FUE into you crown to add density in the future? 

 

5 hours ago, PlzRespond said:

Have you looked into trying to get some more grafts by utilizing FUE in your safe donor area? Also, if you have a decent amount of beard hairs under your neck that is another OK source of grafts from what I understand.

Thanks for writing. I don't know much about going the beard hair route but will look into it. I'd probably explore FUE first. Do you know how well beard hair transplants? Just trying to imagine the process and it imagining it to be quite painful, but maybe I'm wrong. Thanks for sharing this. 

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6 hours ago, Curious said:

Did you have some of the old plugs removed?  How did it work out?

Hi, Curious.

I did have some old big plugs along my hairline removed that couldn't be redistributed because of too much scaring. Some were removed, cut up, and redistributed-- probably < 50%. Removing the big plugs resulted in a more natural, less pluggy, appearance of my hairline. Overall, I'm glad this was done... but a lot of potential hair ended up being wasted ☹️

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10 hours ago, hairlossPA said:

pre op pics? Dr. Bloxham has been posting great results lately. I look forward to following this.

I took some pics yesterday and they came out very poorly. I'll try again soon with better lighting. 

I'm really looking forward to having Dr. Bloxham perform my final ( probably ) hair transplant. He's a great guy and very highly regarded. 

Just curious, I wonder if people had to choose one surgeon to perform their last hair transplant, who would they choose to do it? 

 

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1 hour ago, Bad Hair said:

 

Thanks for writing. I don't know much about going the beard hair route but will look into it. I'd probably explore FUE first. Do you know how well beard hair transplants? Just trying to imagine the process and it imagining it to be quite painful, but maybe I'm wrong. Thanks for sharing this. 

I agree that the best way is probably to start using remaining traditional donor FUE before going with beard. I've heard beard has the best survival after head donor as compared to other sources like body hair. The beard donor is usually single hair grafts that are obviously more coarse then head donor and is used to give bulk to other areas (not used in front hairline). I'd definitely go with someone that is highly skilled in using beard donor as it is more difficult to extract due to the sharp angle of the hairs/roots. 

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  • Regular Member

Hi, all.

My surgery is on Tuesday ( 30th ) and I can't wait. Dr. Bloxham

and his staff have been great preparing me for the procedure.

Below are pix taken today. Sorry I know they're pretty bad.

Hoping for better coverage, but not a lot of donor area left. If I

only have 1200 grafts, where do you think they should go?

 

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I'd go for the frontal third to help frame your face. It looks like you have enough hair in the back/midscalp where hair fibers will still give you a nice boost.

I think there's a decent chance a skilled surgeon like Bloxham will be able to get even more than his 1200 graft estimate, so hopefully you'll get a solid density improvement. Good luck!

Edited by RecessionProof
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@Bad Hair, is that your natural hair color? If so then good on ya cause I’m not quite 40 yet and this hair is going down the silver brick road but fast, man! 

You picked a great surgeon! Im looking forward to following your progress!

Edited by Steeeve
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8 hours ago, RecessionProof said:

I'd go for the frontal third to help frame your face. It looks like you have enough hair in the back/midscalp where hair fibers will still give you a nice boost.

I think there's a decent chance a skilled surgeon like Bloxham will be able to get even more than his 1200 graft estimate, so hopefully you'll get a solid density improvement. Good luck!

Thanks for writing, RP. I agree, probably best to concentrate on the frontal third. Do you think SMP could work on my mid-scalp and crown, or is there not enough hair there? I'm not really sure under which conditions SMP can work for long hair. I've seen some pix but don't know how realistic the treatment is for people like me who have serious hair loss. I'm going to look into FUE as well but I really little donor area left. I'd like this to be my last surgery. 

5 hours ago, Steeeve said:

@Bad Hair, is that your natural hair color? If so then good on ya cause I’m not quite 40 yet and this hair is going down the silver brick road but fast, man! 

You picked a great surgeon! Im looking forward to following your progress!

I dye my hair regularly. There's more gray hair than the pix show. I started getting gray around 35 yrs old. Yes, I really feel Dr. Bloxham will do a great job. Hope this is my last surgery. We'll see.

 

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Quote

I'm not really sure under which conditions SMP can work for long hair. I've seen some pix but don't know how realistic the treatment is for people like me who have serious hair loss.

.....

I dye my hair regularly. There's more gray hair than the pix show. I started getting gray around 35 yrs old.

I don't personally like the idea of getting SMP. I would be always wondering if people can tell I have tattooed dots on my head, but that's me. It's also why I don't use any type of concealers. Another thing with SMP is what happens if you eventually decide to stop dying your hair? Will it look unnatural with the SMP in one area of your crown and the rest of your hair gray? I personally wouldn't want to try it.... but again, that's my own opinion. Some pictures I've seen of SMP done with some hair surrounding it look OK, but I would definitely want to see someone in person who has had it done first.

 

 

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Al

Forum Moderator

(formerly BeHappy)

I am a forum moderator for hairrestorationnetwork.com. I am not a Dr. and I do not work for any particular Dr. My opinions are my own and may not reflect the opinions of other moderators or the owner of this site. I am also a hair transplant patient and repair patient. You can view some of my repair journey here.

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Hi, folks.

Finished my HT with Dr. Bloxham in Tuesday. Great experience working with him, his crew, Cathy, Bella and others. Very professional and kind people. This is likely my last HT as my donor area is pretty tapped out from previous HT's. These last two procedures with Feller-Bloxham ( 2013 and now ) were the best experiences I had by far. Now comes the waiting and hoping that my scalp heals up well. I may do SMP in the future but will wait and see how this new HT grows out. I highly recommend Dr. Bloxham and his staff to anyone who has experienced substandard results previously. They are the best in my book. 

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Thanks for posting your pictures and I hope you keep us updated with your progress. Please consider creating a patient website to track your progress. Our patient websites are now mobile friendly, so it's very easy and convenient.

https://www.hairtransplantnetwork.com/blog/

  • Like 1


I’m a paid admin for Hair Transplant Network. I do not receive any compensation from any clinic. My comments are not medical advice.

Check out my final hair transplant and topical dutasteride journey

View my thread

Topical dutasteride journey 

Melvin- Managing Publisher and Forum Moderator for the Hair Transplant Network, the Coalition Hair Loss Learning Center, and the Hair Loss Q&A Blog.

Follow our Social Media: Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin, and YouTube.

 

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1 hour ago, RecessionProof said:

Looks good! How many grafts did he end up getting?

He put in 1294 grafts. I had a lot of scaring in my donor area, so there wasn't a lot for Dr. Bloxham to work with. He had a lot of area to cover -- center strip from front to back--- and didn't have a lot grafts to work with. He had to harvest smaller strips from a jungle of scars on the back and sides of my head. No easy feat. He clearly handles difficult HT surgeries very well. He then went from front to back planting grafts until they ran out. This was the plan we'd discussed before the surgery and I think it was the correct one. Dr. Bloxham did an excellent job and hope that my hair will now better frame my face, provide more hair in the front center part of my  scalp,  and give me slightly more hair in crown area. We'll see how it grows. SMP may well be in my future to add density that I've always wanted in the crown area. Please let me know if you have any thoughts on SMP for density. I'll post pix in a patient website later as Melvin-Moderator suggested. 

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