FUE Experience w/Dr. Diep MHTA Clinic

[Noodles123]

I have not seen another surgeon say this - ever.   In fact I think we have had several surgeons agree that this implantation pattern results in the appearance of LESS density precisely because you can see directly through those "rows" of hair.  

And his analogy is pretty silly.  The reason farmers plant in rows is because of EFFICIENCY.  To continue this analogy, those farmers want to water and harvest their crops QUICKLY.   Which funnily enough appears to be the SAME reason Diep implants the hair this way - for the sake of SPEED.   His extraction and implantation patterns are about speed.    You can look through my posts and see pictures I've posted of my donor area, which has an obvious rectangular area that was clearly overharvested.  The contrast / demarcation between the untouched areas and the donor area are obvious.   

 

[Sam818]

     I have to commend you for doing such a great job in documenting your case and remaining level headed even though there are things about your surgery that upset you. I think it will really help out anybody who is smart enough to find this forum and do proper research so they know what to expect. Diep is an absolute enigma to me. I’m not a fan of his work but I will admit he has some very impressive results on this forum including Melvin the moderator. He even has some  impressive repairs, both FUT & FUE and yet he has some cases that make you scratch your head.  
      It’s obvious and you can’t deny that lately there is an issue with consistency in his surgical protocol. Some guys get a pattern of rows implanted and others don’t. Some guys get grafts extracted somewhat evenly through the donor area and others don’t. I have no idea why this happens but his explanations make no sense. I do think that doing two procedures a day, one strip case and one fue where you also have to extract the grafts whether you like to or not due to the law day in and day out with his fully booked busy schedule will exhaust even the best surgeons and perhaps force them to take “shortcuts.”                                                  
     Having said all that though I think when it’s all said and done you’ll be happy with the results. Based off of your post op photos you didn’t get the crazy obvious corn row looking grafts implanted and your donor area was extracted pretty evenly so there won’t be an obvious uneven density problem there. You’ll be entering the official growth phase soon so good luck with everything man.

   

[jjsrader]

Diep's work is a bit flaccid and weak as he gets older.  Ultra-efficient in extracting $$'s & takes shortcuts and his work is arguably sloppy and undisciplined as he ages.

Simple as.  We see it over and over from some of the most obsessive OCD patient reports. 

I'm sure his bank account is not suffering though from his decreased attention to detail over time.

Of course everyone has their own opinion. 

[yalla8]

5 hours ago, Sam818 said:

     I have to commend you for doing such a great job in documenting your case and remaining level headed even though there are things about your surgery that upset you. I think it will really help out anybody who is smart enough to find this forum and do proper research so they know what to expect. Diep is an absolute enigma to me. I’m not a fan of his work but I will admit he has some very impressive results on this forum including Melvin the moderator. He even has some  impressive repairs, both FUT & FUE and yet he has some cases that make you scratch your head.  
      It’s obvious and you can’t deny that lately there is an issue with consistency in his surgical protocol. Some guys get a pattern of rows implanted and others don’t. Some guys get grafts extracted somewhat evenly through the donor area and others don’t. I have no idea why this happens but his explanations make no sense. I do think that doing two procedures a day, one strip case and one fue where you also have to extract the grafts whether you like to or not due to the law day in and day out with his fully booked busy schedule will exhaust even the best surgeons and perhaps force them to take “shortcuts.”                                                  
     Having said all that though I think when it’s all said and done you’ll be happy with the results. Based off of your post op photos you didn’t get the crazy obvious corn row looking grafts implanted and your donor area was extracted pretty evenly so there won’t be an obvious uneven density problem there. You’ll be entering the official growth phase soon so good luck with everything man.

   

Perhaps Diep is just strategic (or so he thinks) about where to invest his time and energy. If my patient was the moderator of this forum, I wouldn't want to mess up his head either! It just takes a few impressive results to post to the web. Consistency however is much more difficult to achieve. 

[ShadowMoon]

Running two patients at the same time and having both done before 1 pm is an immediate disqualify. 

Also, farmers plant in rows to accommodate machinery for planting, watering, and harvest and for crop to spread roots more freely to either side. Has nothing at all to do with nutritional supply. He was talking out of his ass. 

[jimcraig152]

I didn't buy it either. I also asked why grafts weren't mapped out for even extraction. He denied it. He said he extracted grafts from all over while whirling his hands around his head in demonstration. Which is somewhat true. I emphasized that some areas clearly had too many grafts extracted and are patchy. He said I might be experiencing shock loss and to give it a year for recovery. I don't think I am experiencing shock loss. But ok, I'll give it a year. Because what else that can be done?

Whether for the sake of speed, efficiency, or to take a shortcut, a compromise is being made. Once one makes that compromise, it makes it that much easier to make that same compromise the next time. Inertia sets in, then everything done is compromise. And that is the state of where Dr. Diep's work is these days; compromised. I think it is a dice roll if you get good work from Dr. Diep these days. Dr. Diep's answer for the row placement is obvious quackery. In any case, I did not ask why he places grafts in rows in hopes of being delivered a reckoning. I was gauging his ethics. And thus the answer received wasn't a lie. It is something much much worse.

End of Week 12 Update

After just 5 months on Fin and Min, I continue to respond well to the meds. Even with vigorous shampooing, I no longer lose hairs. Regrowth in the corners has been exciting (this is natural regrowth, not the transplant grafts which were planted in rows). Vertex regrowth hasn't happened yet. But I'm early with meds treatment. Scalp sensation is about 80% of normal. Still the fleeting occasion of sharp pain in areas mostly outside of the donor or recipient areas.

I might be jinxing myself in that I feel I may be a bit ahead of schedule (1 week and 1 day shy of 3 months post-op) with rebounding out of the ugly duckling stage? You guys be the judge. Maybe my 2x daily use of Min has something to do with it. I am applying Min in the morning after the shower. It stays in all day until just before bed time when I shower again and reapply just before going to bed. And while I was planning to not cut my hair again till Thanksgiving, I was starting to look like Stewie with my hair jutting out on the sides.

So I faded the sides and the back and left the top untouched. It is very cool to have the fade line go right up to the where the temple and hairline meet somewhere on my forehead instead of a 1/3rd of the way in back of my scalp. Now for the pics:

Hey look, how did I get a FUT scar from my FUE procedure? But yeah, like I said, I'll give it a year.

Still have redness. Might be partially due to the Minoxidil.

Too many grafts were taken too far up on the right side near the vertex. My vertex shows more scalp now due to the extractions.

Wide angle shot under 5k LED lights:

Wide angle shot indoors lit from the 6pm mid-October Sun coming through the windows:

I am starting to see multi-hair grafts in the hairline. Will pay attention to this closely as the growth sets in.

 

Edited October 16, 2020 by jimcraig152

[LonelyGraft]

On 10/13/2020 at 11:11 AM, jimcraig152 said:

"To achieve the density we have produced with our patients, we implant in rows. We can implant in randomly but you will not achieve the same density. The blood supply is limited for the grafts. Other doctors....Hasson & Wong do not achieve our levels of density. If you look at farmers, they do not grow in random patterns........"

That was Dr. Diep's answer to my question presented to him last night as to why he implants in rows. So there you have it. The answer and reason why Dr. Diep implants in rows. Admittedly, Dr. Diep does achieve excellent density.

I'll leave that here for you guys to mull over before my next update. Paging a few folks who've wondered why this is done as so:  @Tentpole91, @Dadda, @Noodles123, @Buffaloboy, @hybonix, @BDK081522. Feel free to discuss.

I'm not an expert or medical doctor but I call BS on this one. What does blood supply have to do with implanting in rows? 

 

My question to you and other doctor diep patients is...how long did it take him to do incisions? If he completes 2500 incisions in 30 mins or less I'm guessing he creates rows in an effort to save time. All my opinions of course (don't want to get banned again for giving it)

[hairlossPA]

I'm not farmer but this is quoted from when I google "why do farmers plant in rows" and its one of the top links.

Advantages

A garden with row planting is more visually appealing. The garden looks clean and organized. You will also have sufficient space to to move around the garden. Big plants such as corn, cucumbers, squash and carrots grow better in single rows because these plants possess long vines and roots that need space to crawl freely. The traditional row planting is beneficial to commercial farmers because they must plant crops to accommodate machinery and tools.

Disadvantages

Row planting takes up a lot of space, which restricts the number of plantings, thereby decreasing the harvest. It also takes a great deal of time. Seeds need to be planted one by one and accurate space calculations must be made. Watering efforts are also complicated because of the space between plants.

 

 

long story short... seems like a lot of bullshit, which was originally why I chose not to go with Diep back in the day. He barely gave me a proper consultation. It was like I was on a conveyor belt. He may get great results and his marketing is through the roof, but between his extraction strategy and implanting strategy, its just not right for me. 

Edited October 17, 2020 by hairlossPA

[jimcraig152]

1 hour ago, LonelyGraft said:

My question to you and other doctor diep patients is...how long did it take him to do incisions? If he completes 2500 incisions in 30 mins or less I'm guessing he creates rows in an effort to save time. All my opinions of course (don't want to get banned again for giving it)

No need to opine or speculate:

Approximately 1 hour in total is spent in surgery by Dr. Diep per 1000 FUE units. That includes:

• Administration of anesthesia, local and general
• Administration of scalp expansion fluid
• FU excisions and extractions
• Graft incisions

This excludes any effort to map out the donor area for diffuse/even extraction and less scarring. And whatever else would lend to achieving less noticeable scarring, which is why you pay extra for FUE in the first place. The rest is done by his techs. This is based upon my own experience and the experience of others that I've collated in this post. Check my last post for the immediate outcomes.

6 minutes ago, hairlossPA said:

long story short... seems like a lot of bullshit, which was originally why I chose not to go with Diep back in the day. He barely gave me a proper consultation. It was like I was on a conveyor belt. He may get great results and his marketing is through the roof, but between his extraction strategy and implanting strategy, its just not right for me. 

3 people have DM'ed me here and elsewhere with responses from their surgeons. I can't of course post them for obvious reasons. But the consensus is their surgeons are appalled.

Interestingly enough, just around the corner from my house is an almond farm. I took the panoramic photo from right between a row. Just like @Noodles123 says, it doesn't lead to density. You can see barren dirt all the way through the end of the row. Also, when the crop calls for it, row cropping is used. When the crop can be harvested without a barren row between the crop (alfalfa, flax seed, etc.), planting is done with random disbursement.

You made a well informed decision. I didn't.

 

[jimcraig152]

You get FUE so that you can have less noticeable scarring. You pay a higher premium for FUE too. But yet when people post their FUE results, hardly any focus is placed upon the donor area in the pictures. After doing this for 3 almost months, it is pretty damn tough to take photos of the back of your head.

So, made an inexpensive investment and bought this selfie stick. Has a remote, fill light, and tripod stand. It works with my big-ass iPhone XR even with the case. Holds the phone in place very snuggly. I am putting it through its paces now and getting used to the learning curve. I should be able to take better and more consistent photos going forward.

[Melvin- Admin]

On 10/16/2020 at 6:38 PM, LonelyGraft said:

I'm not an expert or medical doctor but I call BS on this one. What does blood supply have to do with implanting in rows? 

 

My question to you and other doctor diep patients is...how long did it take him to do incisions? If he completes 2500 incisions in 30 mins or less I'm guessing he creates rows in an effort to save time. All my opinions of course (don't want to get banned again for giving it)

You know damn well I’ve never banned you for talking about Diep. You first got banned for making a very crude sexual innuendo about Dr. Nadimi, which I received a very angry  phone call about. Against my better judgment I gave you a second chance. Then you start drama with a Eugenix rep for no apparent reason, other than a desire to stir the pot. I gave you a THIRD chance! I gave you a ANOTHER chance, why? I’m asking myself that question now.

Then you start tell members that we will never acknowledge surgeons who aren’t in the network, a flat out LIE!
I say good things about hattingen, arshad, bruno ferreira, none of which are affiliated. That was your fourth chance. I’m afraid now you are all out of chances. 

[hybonix]

Awesome documentation thus far and everything looks great! I am excited for when you are out of the ugly duckling phase but that will definitely take some time. Please keep up the good work!

[jimcraig152]

End of Week 13 Update:

The selfie stick has proven to be an invaluable tool in the whole HT journey even in the short time since I've owned it. Since improvements are so slow in going, progress day-to-day, week-to-week, even-month-to-month is hard to see. But through milestones, if there is such a thing in HT, progress can be gauged and keeps you preserving. Taking lots of photos helps tons. Having such a cheap tool makes it easy so you don't fall off the wagon. And I am sure, it certainly does help the lurkers that are viewing this thread.

So here is a shot from a few days after the procedure where the scabbing is still prevalent giving you an idea of how many grafts were placed in. The next photo is at the height of the honeymoon phase before the grafts start falling out. Then the 3rd shot shows when I was at the bottom depths of the ugly duckling phase before rebounding. The last shot is where I am today. Given I am one day shy of 3 months from my surgery date, this is effectively my 3 month update.

Once I frame myself, set the distance of the selfie stick on the bathroom counter, set angle of the camera phone, all that is required to take the photos is a quick 45° shuffle of the feet, a glance over the shoulder to check if my shoulders (not head) are still in frame, then a push of a button. So now I am able to take good profile shots

You can see where grafts were taken too high up near the vertex on the right side in the shot below.

Where there was over harvesting of donor grafts is right where the skin folds on my neck. This shot illustrates that with my head tilted back a bit. Being that Dr. Diep's surgical room doesn't have a gurney where you are face down for extractions, you can see why there are over harvested grafts right at the bottom edge of the donor site. Must have been easier for him to pull grafts from there, so he took too many from too small of an area.

 

Edited October 27, 2020 by jimcraig152

[aaron1234]

Looks like you're getting some early growth.  Next few months should be exciting for you!  The red spots in the donor area should continue to settle down as well.  Good luck!

[Sam818]

That early growth is hopefully a great sign. What guard length are you getting your sides cut with? 

[jimcraig152]

1 hour ago, Sam818 said:

That early growth is hopefully a great sign. What guard length are you getting your sides cut with? 

I went a little crazy with the clippers last week. Faded from 3->2->1.5->1->0.5->0. Problem was, every time I stepped into the bathroom I kept grabbing the clippers and doing touch ups. Finally had to lock them away.

[jimcraig152]

2 hours ago, aaron1234 said:

Looks like you're getting some early growth.  Next few months should be exciting for you!  The red spots in the donor area should continue to settle down as well.  Good luck!

To experiment how it would might look, here is the donor in gray scale using GIMP:

[Sam818]

1 hour ago, jimcraig152 said:

I went a little crazy with the clippers last week. Faded from 3->2->1.5->1->0.5->0. Problem was, every time I stepped into the bathroom I kept grabbing the clippers and doing touch ups. Finally had to lock them away.

😂 ya I know what you mean. I remember the first time I tried fading my hair I kept going until I pretty much gave myself a buzz cut. Your donor honestly looks good considering how short your cutting it. Still some redness but I don’t see any hypopigmented scars. 

[jimcraig152]

56 minutes ago, Sam818 said:

😂 ya I know what you mean. I remember the first time I tried fading my hair I kept going until I pretty much gave myself a buzz cut. Your donor honestly looks good considering how short your cutting it. Still some redness but I don’t see any hypopigmented scars. 

At different angles it looks worse.

[yalla8]

Jim, your donor still looks raw and I believe is grounds for some compensation. However your recipient is looking good to me. The corn rows, while still there, become less obvious as the hair grows longer. 

[jimcraig152]

6 minutes ago, yalla8 said:

Jim, your donor still looks raw and I believe is grounds for some compensation. However your recipient is looking good to me. The corn rows, while still there, become less obvious as the hair grows longer. 

I feel differently. Now that the hair is longer, the rows are more noticeable to me. Also, i am waiting for the zig zags to come in too. The hairline looks very linear IRL. The camera tends to not show these things. Will just have to wait it out and evalucept if I have to go in for a repair. The camera also doesn't pick up the complete story of the depletion in the lower area of my donor and near the right of the vertex. Looks worse in the mirror. Maybe I'll record a video so it is depicted better.

But, I am lucky. Other patients really get jobbed by Dr. Diep's method of not planning/mapping out donor harvesting and/or not diffusing extractions. I feel his transection rate must be on average high. This patient's donor looks like he had as many FU's extracted as I did, but this patient only had 1300 grafts.

Anyhow, I really do appreciate the remarks. Both the reassuring ones and especially the critical ones. The others to follow should know what they are up against.

[aaron1234]

6 hours ago, jimcraig152 said:

I feel differently. Now that the hair is longer, the rows are more noticeable to me. Also, i am waiting for the zig zags to come in too. The hairline looks very linear IRL.

The rows are noticeable, but more so on your right (?) side.  You'll likely need to wear your hair at a certain length to obfuscate the rows.  Also, rest easy knowing that this is an easy fix with round 2.

[MagnificentAl]

6 hours ago, jimcraig152 said:

I feel differently. Now that the hair is longer, the rows are more noticeable to me. Also, i am waiting for the zig zags to come in too. The hairline looks very linear IRL. The camera tends to not show these things. Will just have to wait it out and evalucept if I have to go in for a repair. The camera also doesn't pick up the complete story of the depletion in the lower area of my donor and near the right of the vertex. Looks worse in the mirror. Maybe I'll record a video so it is depicted better.

But, I am lucky. Other patients really get jobbed by Dr. Diep's method of not planning/mapping out donor harvesting and/or not diffusing extractions. I feel his transection rate must be on average high. This patient's donor looks like he had as many FU's extracted as I did, but this patient only had 1300 grafts.

Anyhow, I really do appreciate the remarks. Both the reassuring ones and especially the critical ones. The others to follow should know what they are up against.

It looks like, if I’m Looking at you, face to face and I can’t really notice those infamous rows. But on the picture where you take it from the right side angle it’s very obvious. I don’t know how noticeable it will be for someone that doesn’t know what’s going on. Maybe it’s not that noticeable to others?

[yalla8]

What gets me about this is that 1) the dr refuses to acknowledge it is an issue -- to the contrary, he doubles down and claims it is advantageous; and 2) it was easily avoidable. I hope Diep sees this thread and offers a better explanation, apology, or refund to you. Did you have to sign away your right to sue him when you went under the knife?

[jimcraig152]

5 hours ago, MagnificentAl said:

It looks like, if I’m Looking at you, face to face and I can’t really notice those infamous rows. But on the picture where you take it from the right side angle it’s very obvious. I don’t know how noticeable it will be for someone that doesn’t know what’s going on. Maybe it’s not that noticeable to others?

The rows are on the left side too. But he tends to do a better job on the left side. The rows are packed closer together so they look less noticeable. Check out @Tentpole91's thread. His rows are very noticeable. And that point of view thing you are describing is just like the below farm crop. It is noticeable and once seen can't be unseen.

Aren't you glad you didn't go with Diep?

3 hours ago, yalla8 said:

What gets me about this is that 1) the dr refuses to acknowledge it is an issue -- to the contrary, he doubles down and claims it is advantageous; and 2) it was easily avoidable. I hope Diep sees this thread and offers a better explanation, apology, or refund to you. Did you have to sign away your right to sue him when you went under the knife?

You sign away your right to sue and agree to abitration. I should have ran when I saw that.