Effect of diet and nutrition on hair transplants & graft survival [opinion]

[GHTJourneya]

Does nutrition (including drinks, alcohol and caffeine) have any effect on the progress of a hair transplant, can it actually affect graft survival?

 

I asked some doctors about it and here is both what I know and what I was told:

- [doctor A's say]: It is not clinically proven that nutrition is related to hair loss. Patients with some form of deficiency may experience some form of hair loss, but it is not yet understood if that kind of hair loss will be permanent. 

- [doctor B's say]: Getting hair-friendly vitamins is a nice way to ensure your hair has all the nutrients it needs to grow. As long as you follow a normal diet you have nothing to worry about.

- Does that mean I can drink a beer, have ice-cream and pizza?

- [doctor B's say] Yes, you can eat what you usually eat, as long as you follow a healthy diet, mischiefs are allowed every now and then.

 

[What I know]: 
According to some studies (will cite the dois when I find some time), food types with high-glycemic index (like white rice, white bread, pasta) cause sugar spikes which may lead to seborrheic dermatitis (or insulin-induced telogen effluvium, but that does not count as hair loss nor can affect graft survival). The effect of scalp dermatitis on graft survival is not very well understood either.

 

I would highly appreciate your opinions on this, it looks like it is not very well understood and there is zero guidance on post-op nutrition, apart from the usual vitamin & iron rich supplements that doctors tend to prescribe.

[NARMAK]

We know that low Vitamin D for example does play a role in hair loss. We also know scalp inflammation etc. as well can play a role in hair loss. 

Hair loss is multi factorial and not all is down to Androgenic Alopecia necessarily. Stress for example can make individuals go through a drastic shedding with telogen effluvium and also we know people going through Chemo lose their hair but after treatment it usually goes back to normal. 

So it's always a potential factor that smoking, nutrition and drinking alcohol could play some part. What isn't exactly known and agreed upon is to what degree those things impact. However, for male pattern hairloss, it is generally acknowledged by the science that DHT plays the most prominent role in hair loss. 

All the other things aren't seen as permanent in their ability to cause hair loss. 

[RTC]

I'm sure EVERYTHING plays a part.

If you have twins, and twin A lives a fantastic lifestyle, sleeps well, works out (although I suspect lifting may accelerate hair loss), eats well, he may end up having significantly different hair to twin B who does everything 'wrong'.

Everything we do affects everything we are to some extent.

Edit: I see this was about graft survival rather than hair loss. I still stand by what I wrote above, although it's such a short-term thing I doubt what you eat and drink has THAT much an impact on survival of hair grafts.

Edited May 1, 2022 by Aslitarcan sucks

[Euphoria]

The only thing that I have read is smoking seriously hinders healing and the results you will get from a HT. This is a case with every surgery, some bone surgeons (orthopaedics) don’t even consider surgery on smokers because the bone just doesn’t heal and the surgery is useless. 

Rest of the stuff doesn’t matter. Just have multivitamins and healthy food that helps with healing process.