Hair transplant growth maturation (hair caliber/thickness) timeline?

[Lightmare]

We've all seen the hair transplant timeline pictures and descriptions, and have read that new growth in months 3-6 after a hair transplant appears 'thin, wiry, or kinky'.  Descriptions are nice but it would be nice to get quantitative on that.  I have never actually seen studies or graphs on hair caliber as a function of time. 

Caliber is known to be similarly important as density to hide the scalp among hairs.  Note, I am not talking about the number of new hairs 'popping' or sprouting through the scalp, or even about the final appearance timeline, which we can find pretty easily with a google search.  It'd be wonderful to see something quantitative in the 'appearance' section  !

I am talking about hair caliber / thickness as a function of time from when they sprouted.  Basically I am looking for something like the below made up (by me) graph (it'd probably consist of a mean of hair calibers of many patients...I don't know if post HT differs in this way relative to native hair growth).  It is likely buried in some medical literature somewhere, and I have done some searching with no findings on this, but I'd love if someone could post a pointer (graph or pictures would be best!)

The boiled down version of the question I have is, do new HT growth start out as vellus hairs and turn terminal, or generally start out thicker than vellus but less than terminal, due to where they were in their cycle before transplantation?  Also, how much % increase in shaft diameter can you expect from first 'popping' out of the scalp until final maturation?  I am following my hair transplant growth with a microscope and don't want to get excited seeing a bunch of native vellus hairs on my scalp that are on their last legs and will likely die out.

This piece by Dr. Bloxham was a really nice read on the subject but the pictures don't work for me unfortunately.  And I think they were more showing patients' growth, not diagrams of what individual hairs look like up close. @Blake Bloxhamthank you for the work there  any comments from you about this would be awesome! 

I think this type of knowledge would further equip anxious growers with extra assurance that things will turn out ok.  

Thanks!

 

 

Edited November 12, 2021 by Lightmare

[Lightmare]

Oops, double post

 

Edited November 12, 2021 by Lightmare

[HappyMan2021]

Its important to keep in mind that, in one's natural state, hair can behave very differently depending on its region. Your hairline hair may be tame and straight, while hair in the donor region may naturally be more wild and curly. So when a hair transplant happens the recipient hair can look differently. This is a permanent change. 

I had a chat with Dr. Diep last year about my own hair texture issues (my recipient hair is pretty wild and curly - much different than native hair) and he said it can take anywhere from 3-5 years for transplant hair to truly enter its final stage and "settle down". Also keep in mind, hair transplants aside, the life hair lifespan is something like 7 years, and every 7 years the hair can naturally change its shape. 

[Melvin- Admin]

Watch these two videos

 

[Lightmare]

Thanks so much for your reply Melvin!  Those are really well made videos, and it's always encouraging to see slow growers that had awesome results, it does help out a lot.  However my question is more about the quantitative/objective progression of hair caliber because aesthetics and macro pictures have too many uncontrolled variables (surgeon, graft yield, graft placement, hair type, hair caliber, hair color, scalp color, whether they're on meds / minoxidil, whether they had native hair in the region and how thick it was, etc), even before accounting for things like inconsistent hair length and lighting in the photo diaries and seasonal sheds.  

By just listing the fraction of the maximum surviving hair caliber/thickness as a function of time after sprouting, most or all of those variables might be controlled for (i.e. regardless of who did the transplant, the hair that survived should reach some max hair caliber eventually and this should be trackable with fiducials) and we could get a good idea of how much thickening is really left, especially behind the hairline. 

Edited November 12, 2021 by Lightmare

[Lightmare]

Sadman2021, great point that each hair has its own characteristics, I'd be curious to see if the variation in donor or recipient location plays a significant part in fraction of maximum hair caliber as a function of time from sprouting.  I have heard that the crown grows 'slower' for a few reasons (blood flow is less, the whorl pattern requires greater density and angular variation thus making layering effects harder etc). 

Of course the "curve" could really be a family of curves, possibly one curve for each part of the donor and/or recipient region.  But aggregate statistics or a single curve might also be good enough to get a ballpark estimate.  It'd be interesting to see for sure. 

Edited November 12, 2021 by Lightmare

[gillenator]

I did not notice full hair shaft diameter maturation until approximately 15-18 months post-op.

[Lightmare]

Thanks gilleanator - that is indeed pretty far after the operation.  I'm curious if you know roughly what factor of improvement to expect, e.g. 2x, 5x or 10x increase in shaft diameter, that a given healthy transplanted hair will thicken up to relative to when it first popped from the scalp?  

Edited November 12, 2021 by Lightmare