RANKING TOP 10 - Wesley, H&W, Pak, Carman, Mohebi, Feller, Rassman, Shapiro...

[Adam7463]

Looking for a HT Surgeon in US (also including H&W). Below is the list of the top 10 that I've found during my research (could be wrong). I was wondering if people could provide their top 5 and if they could provide any personal experience, including any of them to avoid. I'm leaning towards Wesley but not so many reviews on him in comparison to the others. Otherwise I was thinking H&W.

1. Wesley

2. Hasson & Wang

3. Jae Pak

4. Timothy Carman

5. Ron Shapiro

6. Konior

7. Rassman

8. Diep

9. Parsa Mohebi

10. Feller & Bloxham

 

 

 

Edited September 16, 2021 by Adam7463

[BigMike27]

Interesting rankings. Konior/Nadhimi  should be higher but im interested to see what everyone says here.

[makehairgreatagain]

FUT or FUE? Have you consulted with any of them yet? Do you have pictures to share? Goals on what you want to achieve? There's too many unknowns currently to make a fair assessment.

[Britanium]

Erm.. that should be Hasson and WONG … 😀

[aaron1234]

Rassman still does surgery? 

[JayLDD]

8 hours ago, Adam7463 said:

Looking for a HT Surgeon in US (also including H&W). Below is the list of the top 10 that I've found during my research (could be wrong). I was wondering if people could provide their top 5 and if they could provide any personal experience, including any of them to avoid. I'm leaning towards Wesley but not so many reviews on him in comparison to the others. Otherwise I was thinking H&W.

1. Wesley

2. Hasson & Wang

3. Jae Pak

4. Timothy Carman

5. Ron Shapiro

6. Konior

7. Rassman

8. Diep

9. Parsa Mohebi

10. Feller & Bloxham

 

 

 

Rassman is an industry veteran but no longer at the same standard as the rest of the list. Jae Pak who I think trained under Rassman is similarly below par in my opinion, these are realself celebs in that they (or their marketing team) responds to ample questions on the website to get their names out but ultimately they aren't at the top of the industry. 

Not to say the rest of the list are bad surgeons, but the only options here I personally would happily pay money for are Konior, Hasson/Wong and Bloxham.  The rest don't differentiate themselves from the pack in an impressive enough way for me to consider them or don't reach levels of what I would desire for consistency/aesthetics for the price. 

In terms of hairline aesthetics and density Hasson in particular is above the rest. Wong and Konior do some of the best crown work in the world, Konior being one of the best generalists simultaneously and who I'd choose if money wasn't a consideration. Bloxham and Nadimi at Konior's clinic are in a slightly lower bracket albeit both significantly cheaper than Konior and both doing consistently good work. Nadimi occasionally too conservative for my taste however. 

Wesley does good work but for the price I can't see a convincing reason not to choose Hasson/Wong if those are the main considerations. 

 

 

[hybonix]

Shapiro is best bang for buck when compared to the others IMO. Paid substantially less money and super pleased with my results. Chose them over H&W.

[Future Hair Doc]

1 hour ago, aaron1234 said:

Rassman still does surgery? 

Yes, he does surgeries. Not as many though

[Runitback]

3 hours ago, BigMike27 said:

Interesting rankings. Konior/Nadhimi  should be higher but im interested to see what everyone says here.

Just went to Nadimi last Monday.  Same office as konior.    Really clean work. She did everything, with help from techs.   I think the techs said that they work 5 days and so I think it’s the same techs for both Nadimi and konior.  At least that was my interpretation while on Valium. Her waiting list is may2022, konior is already in 2023. 

[MachoVato]

Of that list, Wong is the only doctor I would consider. Konior sounds great but I can't swallow his prices, even if I can afford it. 

[Melvin- Admin]

I do not believe Dr. Feller performs surgery anymore.

[Adam7463]

Thanks for the input. I've spoken to most except for Rassman.

I'd say either FUT/FUE , although some of these mainly just do FUT like Feller & Bloxham  (I think Bloxham does most of the surgeries). 

My only concern with H&W is that they seem to do high megasessions and that just makes me a little anxious personally. I'm looking for someone to do ~2000 (maybe little less) mainly hairline and midscalp.  I also heard about dr. robin unger the daughter of walter but her before & afters don't seem so impressive. 

@Runitback thanks for providing waitlist times, does anyone happen to know the others? I've spoke to most prepandemic so figure waitlists are now longer

 

 

Edited September 17, 2021 by Adam7463

[MachoVato]

Just now, Adam7463 said:

Thanks for the input. I've spoken to most except for Rassman.

I'd say either FUT/FUE , although some of these mainly just do FUT like Feller & Bloxham  (I think Bloxham does most of the surgeries). 

My only concern with H&W is that they seem to do high megasessions and that just makes me a little anxious personally. I'm looking for someone to do ~2000 (maybe little less) mainly hairline and midscalp.  I also heard about dr. robin unger the daughter of walter but her before & afters don't seem so impressive. 

 

Do you not want to consider a European clinic?

[Adam7463]

I live in the northeast of the US and feel like there are enough good options here. If I were to travel out of the country I think I would do H&W.

[Hair4Days]

3 minutes ago, Adam7463 said:

Thanks for the input. I've spoken to most except for Rassman.

I'd say either FUT/FUE , although some of these mainly just do FUT like Feller & Bloxham  (I think Bloxham does most of the surgeries). 

My only concern with H&W is that they seem to do high megasessions and that just makes me a little anxious personally. I'm looking for someone to do ~2000 (maybe little less) mainly hairline and midscalp.  I also heard about dr. robin unger the daughter of walter but her before & afters don't seem so impressive. 

@Runitback thanks for providing waitlist times, does anyone happen to know the others? I've spoke to most prepandemic so figure waitlists are now longer

 

 

I said the same thing about h&w. I’ve seen cases of theirs where they’ll say a frontal third received at outlandish graft count like 4,000. When You usually see 2500 for the same sized recipient zone.

[deeznuts]

5 hours ago, James C said:

I said the same thing about h&w. I’ve seen cases of theirs where they’ll say a frontal third received at outlandish graft count like 4,000. When You usually see 2500 for the same sized recipient zone.

That's never bothered me that much with them. A lot of people appreciate the higher density and they seem pretty confident that they can predict future loss fairly accurately while still leaving enough donor should  balding progress further. Plus, a lot of people would rather just get one hair transplant instead of having to get 2 or 3 to do the same thing.

Plus, those kinds of operations are on guys with limited future loss, lower NWs and for the most part just guys who aren't strapped for donor and benefit from less operations/higher density

[Hair4Days]

5 hours ago, deeznuts said:

That's never bothered me that much with them. A lot of people appreciate the higher density and they seem pretty confident that they can predict future loss fairly accurately while still leaving enough donor should  balding progress further. Plus, a lot of people would rather just get one hair transplant instead of having to get 2 or 3 to do the same thing.

Plus, those kinds of operations are on guys with limited future loss, lower NWs and for the most part just guys who aren't strapped for donor and benefit from less operations/higher density

It’s rare you get a doctor who will personally predict or guarantee someone’s final balding pattern especially at a young age. You just can’t do it. I’ve seen people have the thickest hair with no sign of balding at 25, and lose it all at 40.  Every consult I’ve had with these top tier surgeons never want to directly say what can or cannot be done and the reason is always because it’s borderline impossible to predict someone’s final Norwood level. So i don’t necessarily agree with packing a frontal third with 4000 grafts regardless of the situation. That’s more than half of your donor supply.  I also thought 40 grafts per sq cm gives the illusion of your native density on average? Why would you need to pack that many grafts in a 80 sq cm zone

[HairNTear]

Dr Jerry Cooley should be on that list IMO

[deeznuts]

3 hours ago, James C said:

It’s rare you get a doctor who will personally predict or guarantee someone’s final balding pattern especially at a young age. You just can’t do it. I’ve seen people have the thickest hair with no sign of balding at 25, and lose it all at 40.  Every consult I’ve had with these top tier surgeons never want to directly say what can or cannot be done and the reason is always because it’s borderline impossible to predict someone’s final Norwood level. So i don’t necessarily agree with packing a frontal third with 4000 grafts regardless of the situation. That’s more than half of your donor supply.  I also thought 40 grafts per sq cm gives the illusion of your native density on average? Why would you need to pack that many grafts in a 80 sq cm zone

I think H&W don't claim to be able to but that they can make an educated guess and they leave themselves enough leeway so that should the balding progress further than they expect, they still have enough donor hair to fix it. I think from Dr. Wongs IG Q&A he basically said that they've only had a couple patients in his entire career get to a NW7 or w/e pattern against their predictions. Plus it's rare that someone who's NW2 at age 40 for example suddenly progresses to a NW7 especially once you add in the doctor looking for future loss. So while it's good to prepare for the worst case, sometimes, preparing for the worst case hurts your ability to fix the average case.

Anyway, the frontal third is where you want most of your donor hair anyway. It's not like the midscalp really needs that much density. 

H&W is pretty aggressive for sure but I'm personally willing to risk the potential I run out of donor hairs on the off chance I suddenly become the third patient who unexpectedly progresses to a NW7. I'd much prefer to improve my average case than to prepare for the worst case while not necessarily making significant sacrifices in the worst case scenario. 

[JayLDD]

16 hours ago, James C said:

It’s rare you get a doctor who will personally predict or guarantee someone’s final balding pattern especially at a young age. You just can’t do it. I’ve seen people have the thickest hair with no sign of balding at 25, and lose it all at 40.  Every consult I’ve had with these top tier surgeons never want to directly say what can or cannot be done and the reason is always because it’s borderline impossible to predict someone’s final Norwood level. So i don’t necessarily agree with packing a frontal third with 4000 grafts regardless of the situation. That’s more than half of your donor supply.  I also thought 40 grafts per sq cm gives the illusion of your native density on average? Why would you need to pack that many grafts in a 80 sq cm zone

In my opinion the "you can't predict someone's final balding pattern especially at a young age"  is baseless psuedo-science. Its a fragment of old world industry beliefs based in the 1990s and early 2000s-2010s where surgeons hadn't developed the craft to the point where they could appease younger patients or give them natural hairlines. The potential of the average donor wasn't as well known then as it is now. To talk about lack of ability to predict was merely an excuse to focus on more older and less demanding patients, which even when I first came to the forum were a much more significant portion of hair transplant candidates. 

You can't "guarantee" it of course, but if someone is diffusing in a NW5 pattern and has maintained thick lateral humps its unlikely they will turn into a NW6-7 by some force of magic. To avoid transplanting a youthful hairline because someone who has a *clear* current NW5 diffusion could potential hit NW6 at a 2-3% chance is madness in my opinion. You can't guarantee, but you can do an awful lot of accurate predicting. A surgeon can also visually check through various tools for miniaturisation in the donor outside the clear safe zone. Everything in life is a gamble of sorts, its the odds that matter. 

I also think people need to distinguish between senile alopecia and androgen based hairloss.  Sure you see people in their late 50s+ who develop significant progression and diffusing across the scalp, but this is a world apart from someone who is in their 20s or 30s. Making a decision based on the short term of the next few years without risk management? Bad idea. Making decisions based on what is optimal for 15-20 years? Entirely different story, most people will be better off optimising their looks in their 20s-50s and and take at worst be left with a bald patch beyond this. The truth about donor areas is that with competent surgeons and overly large punches etc, people very, very rarely max out their potential graft numbers with either FUE or FUT, let alone both (which is a route very few take). 

Realistically, if someone is balding in a NW5 pattern and has a reasonable donor they can afford a lifetime approach of giving them an ultra NW1 hairline, assuming the surgeon is competent with donor management and the grafts grow. I personally would trust Hasson with this. Why do I trust the approach? Because I've seen 100x more people questioning the approach than people who are negatively effected by it. 40 grafts per sq cm or even less is a good baseline for *coverage* specifically,  which behind the hairline will appear to reflect good density. The hairline and frontal third can generally benefit all the way up to natural density, albeit at 40-50 will still tend to look natural and full. 

 

[Der3k7]

I think it would be a good idea to consider Freitas in Spain. I was debating between Diep and HW for awhile and I've been looking more into Freitas at the recommendation of others on this forum and every review I've seen so far has been really good results from him and he's a lot cheaper than diep and HW. You'd save a lot of money too even with the flight

[Z--]

The results I’ve been most impressed with are Konior, H&W, and Couto. If money is no object (and the longer wait times work out), I’d select the one whose style matches what you are looking for. 

Keep in mind that from speaking/contacting reps (or Konior himself in that case) with all three, the impression I get is that Couto is excellent with Mediterranean hair but will take the longest (as even a consultation takes months to years and surgery the year after), H&W do amazing crown work and have shorter wait time and I think slightly cheaper per graft (but require fin for higher Norwoods, which I simply can’t do, unfortunately). Konior is more expensive per graft, but he has a great sense of donor management and churns out brilliant results with less grafts. 
 

For more affordable options, Freitas, the folks at Eugenix, and Shapiro have some homeruns. 

[Adam7463]

Thanks for the input everyone. It seems as though Konior really is the favorite with H&W a close second. Out of curiosity, with the exception of this network there aren't many reviews or articles on him or his clinic? Any reason why is or that the industry norm and some other doctors just invest in online marketing campaigns? Thanks. 

[Britanium]

3 minutes ago, Adam7463 said:

Thanks for the input everyone. It seems as though Konior really is the favorite with H&W a close second. Out of curiosity, with the exception of this network there aren't many reviews or articles on him or his clinic? Any reason why is or that the industry norm and some other doctors just invest in online marketing campaigns? Thanks. 

Marketing definitely depends on the clinic. Some don’t even really need to advertise that much at all. 

[Anand]

Any reason why Dr Gabel is not on the list?