Verteporfin HAIR REGENERATION HUMAN TRIAL Dr. Barghouthi *OFFICIAL THREAD

[Melvin- Admin]

17 minutes ago, Dragonsphere said:

In response to your second paragraph 

We can go by what Dr Barghouthi has said who has had the best visual observation of the test site. 

1. The 0.4 site looks untouched

2. The biopsy in the 0.3T site showed double the amount of hairs than the control site. There were also no transacted hairs visible. The 0.4T site was better than the 0.3T site so I think we can conclude it was much more than 25%. 

Be more positive, like you were in the below. 🙂

 

I am positive. I have gone through many lengths to get Verteporfin studied. Reaching out to doctors going to conferences, etc. But I do believe we have to be objective and not get too caught up in hype. Dr. Bisanga made some valid points, and we really can’t make any definitive claims with just photos. We need actual quantitative data that cannot be refuted.  Even Dr. Barghouthi agrees.

 

[Gwazi]

2 hours ago, Melvin- Admin said:

Im not following this logic, if it can regenerate 25% it can regenerate 100%? That makes no sense. Based on the only two human trials we have, it did NOT regenerate 100% not even close. Furthermore, we don’t have any definitive quantitative data to show exactly how many grafts regenerated. Surgeons like Dr. Bisanga claim that some of those hairs could have been partially transected or telogen hairs. There’s no way to refute that using photos alone. 
 

How am I cherry picking when there’s only two trials to pick. I’m speaking objectively. We can’t let the hype train get ahead of us. Verteporfin is worth exploring, but it’s not a proven treatment and way more studies with better designs need to be done. These wild speculations and assumptions isn’t good overall. It could lead someone to making a bad decision choosing a hair mill to do their surgery in hopes Verteporfin will be the equalizer, it won’t!

Okay so if it “didn’t regenerate 100%, not even close” in Barghouthi’s trial, how much did it regenerate? I have never seen another person ever say “oh yeah that looks like only 25% regeneration at most” when looking at this picture lol. I’m not sure why you’re choosing to die on such a weird hill, when it’s pretty obvious that looks like more than 25% regeneration. Probably not 100%, but it looks untouched, unless you want to claim Barghouthi is wrong and it’s not untouched, it’s actually 75% thinner than the surrounding hair.

 

You realize that you are the one that brought up a number in the first place right? Someone was talking about theoretical full donor area regeneration and then you say “well actually it will only regenerate 25% of your hair at most” which is an extremely weird and unfounded claim. 

 

Lastly, you aren’t following my logic that if it can regenerate 25% of your hair, then theoretically it can regenerate all of it? Okay then. Let me try to explain. If verteporfin can regenerate one hair follicle, why wouldn’t it be able to generate the hair follicle right next to it which is pretty much the same? Can you give me a reason in which one hair follicle can regenerate but one can’t that’s right next to it? To me the only reason I can think of is not a strong enough dosage or the procedure needs to be altered in someway. So let’s say we got the dosage and procedure perfect, then theoretically every hair should be able to regenerate. Like is there a big difference between hair follicles in your donor area where half can regenerate and half can’t? I sincerely do not understand why 75% just are unable to regenerate as you claim. It doesn’t make sense to me

 

Sorry if Im coming off as rude, Im not trying to be 

 

Edited May 10 by Gwazi

[TV_on_LazerDisk]

17 minutes ago, Gwazi said:

Okay so if it “didn’t regenerate 100%, not even close” in Barghouthi’s trial, how much did it regenerate? I have never seen another person ever say “oh yeah that looks like only 25% regeneration at most” when looking at this picture lol. I’m not sure why you’re choosing to die on such a weird hill, when it’s pretty obvious that looks like more than 25% regeneration. Probably not 100%, but it looks untouched, unless you want to claim Barghouthi is wrong and it’s not untouched, it’s actually 75% thinner than the surrounding hair.

 

You realize that you are the one that brought up a number in the first place right? Someone was talking about theoretical full donor area regeneration and then you say “well actually it will only regenerate 25% of your hair at most” which is an extremely weird and unfounded claim. 

 

Lastly, you aren’t following my logic that if it can regenerate 25% of your hair, then theoretically it can regenerate all of it? Okay then. Let me try to explain. If verteporfin can regenerate one hair follicle, why wouldn’t it be able to generate the hair follicle right next to it which is pretty much the same? Can you give me a reason in which one hair follicle can regenerate but one can’t that’s right next to it? To me the only reason I can think of is not a strong enough dosage or the procedure needs to be altered in someway. So let’s say we got the dosage and procedure perfect, then theoretically every hair should be able to regenerate. Like is there a big difference between hair follicles in your donor area where half can regenerate and half can’t? I sincerely do not understand why 75% just are unable to regenerate as you claim. It doesn’t make sense to me

 

Sorry if Im coming off as rude, Im not trying to be 

 

Let's just wait for the new studies/trials, to get a better idea. No use guessing especially when we have talented doctors doing studies.

[Nikoni]

@DrTBarghouthi were you able to follow up with the patient ? If consistent with the first trial. some hair growth should start already.

Also as there are many discussions about regeneration percentage, maybe you could call in the first patient to compare hair count in test/control sites via the new trichoscanner device ?

[Fox243]

18 hours ago, Melvin- Admin said:

I am positive. I have gone through many lengths to get Verteporfin studied. Reaching out to doctors going to conferences, etc. But I do believe we have to be objective and not get too caught up in hype. Dr. Bisanga made some valid points, and we really can’t make any definitive claims with just photos. We need actual quantitative data that cannot be refuted.  Even Dr. Barghouthi agrees.

 

22 hours ago, Melvin- Admin said:

I agree, the top docs will be even higher and more desirable. The hair mills will still be hair mills and have botched patients. I don’t think that will change. The good mid range surgeons may be able to harvest more grafts, which will be good for those on a budget. But I don’t think Verteporfin will put them on par with the very best.

I'm probably the biggest bull there is and I've been researching this for two years. But why are we all wasting time and energy speculating on verteporfin? Instead, people should be like Melvin and actually be productive with verteporfin. Reach out to your surgeons. Keep sharing new evidence with them. Persuade them to at least try out verteporfin. Modify this doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1s3JkF9woMIebkXbpE_UxrjBfNy9i7AuBclDqn9HGrAo/edit to help onboard surgeons. So many better things to do that will actually lead us to getting this on our heads rather than endlessly debating on the forum.

[Jonathan]

On 5/9/2024 at 5:36 PM, Melvin- Admin said:

I am positive. I have gone through many lengths to get Verteporfin studied. Reaching out to doctors going to conferences, etc. But I do believe we have to be objective and not get too caught up in hype. Dr. Bisanga made some valid points, and we really can’t make any definitive claims with just photos. We need actual quantitative data that cannot be refuted.  Even Dr. Barghouthi agrees.

 

Why does everyone ignore the biopsy that Dr B had with double the hairs when injected with verteporfin (don’t remember which dose) than the area without? I understand being skeptic but some of this is ignoring previous facts.

[Rasputin]

16 hours ago, Fox243 said:

I'm probably the biggest bull there is and I've been researching this for two years. But why are we all wasting time and energy speculating on verteporfin? Instead, people should be like Melvin and actually be productive with verteporfin. Reach out to your surgeons. Keep sharing new evidence with them. Persuade them to at least try out verteporfin. Modify this doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1s3JkF9woMIebkXbpE_UxrjBfNy9i7AuBclDqn9HGrAo/edit to help onboard surgeons. So many better things to do that will actually lead us to getting this on our heads rather than endlessly debating on the forum.

And what do you know what I do or not ?

If you see my previous messages on this thread I was supposed to have a surgery with Dr Pittella. I asked about the possibility of a trial of Verteporfin while he would deplete ALL of my beard graft.

That would have leave absolutely no doubt on the fact that it regenerates hair or no. Unfortunately, it seems that Dr Pittella would do a trial on someone living in Brasil for better follow ups, which I totally understand.

Also, more recently, I've asked if anyone know the name of the center in Greece that is already using Verteporfin for scar revision. This is not a sure thing but why not try and revise one of my scar I have due to a vaccine made when I was a kid.

Lastly, I had a post-op consultation with Dr Mwamba in 2022, where I mentionned about what he thinks of Verteporfin. At this time, he didn't know. He told me he would have a look and even wrote the name on a post-it.

This is just me. What others do I don't know. But we can't just affirm they write on this forum without doing anything else, even though it might be true. Or not.

Edited May 11 by Rasputin
Grammar mistakes

[sansi]

I think we shouldn't necessarily focus on hair restoration surgeons. Other surgeons maybe interested as well, and if they can heal scars elsewhere on the body, that will work also on the scar.

BTW it's been 10 months since Bloxham did the trial, I don't understand why he doesn't update, any news  will be educational for us. If someone can contact him  that would be good.

[Fox243]

3 hours ago, Rasputin said:

And what do you know what I do or not ?

If you see my previous messages on this thread I was supposed to have a surgery with Dr Pittella. I asked about the possibility of a trial of Verteporfin while he would deplete ALL of my beard graft.

That would have leave absolutely no doubt on the fact that it regenerates hair or no. Unfortunately, it seems that Dr Pittella would do a trial on someone living in Brasil for better follow ups, which I totally understand.

Also, more recently, I've asked if anyone know the name of the center in Greece that is already using Verteporfin for scar revision. This is not a sure thing but why not try and revise one of my scar I have due to a vaccine made when I was a kid.

Lastly, I had a post-op consultation with Dr Mwamba in 2022, where I mentionned about what he thinks of Verteporfin. At this time, he didn't know. He told me he would have a look and even wrote the name on a post-it.

This is just me. What others do I don't know. But we can't just affirm they write on this forum without doing anything else, even though it might be true. Or not.

Sorry, not trying to refer to any individual. Just was commenting more generally that it would be amazing if we could keep spreading the word and persisting. Most docs don't read the forum, so all the time we spend back and forth here isn't as productive.

[Dragonsphere]

 

59 minutes ago, Fox243 said:

Sorry, not trying to refer to any individual. Just was commenting more generally that it would be amazing if we could keep spreading the word and persisting. Most docs don't read the forum, so all the time we spend back and forth here isn't as productive.

I think there is only so much that can be achieved via word of mouth. When further results come in is when, hopefully, momentum will pick up. If the forum wish to start another fundraiser for another trials, i will happily donate substantially towards it. 

 

On 5/10/2024 at 1:02 AM, Gwazi said:

If verteporfin can regenerate one hair follicle, why wouldn’t it be able to generate the hair follicle right next to it which is pretty much the same?

I think it is just a percentage game; FUE wounds are very uniform. Essentially a certain amount of Yap inhibition will result in some areas healing by regeneration rather than fibrosis. We need to find the right dose, concentration and injection method to maximise that percentage. I also don't think that the hairs that did not regenerate are lost forever but possibly, if the scars are opened again with verteporfin a similar % would regenerate. If this is the case, which is not far fetched at all, we would have a scenario of unlimited donor hair, even if the regeneration rate is as low as 20%. 

 

 

[DrTBarghouthi]

On 5/10/2024 at 6:46 AM, Nikoni said:

@DrTBarghouthi were you able to follow up with the patient ? If consistent with the first trial. some hair growth should start already.

Also as there are many discussions about regeneration percentage, maybe you could call in the first patient to compare hair count in test/control sites via the new trichoscanner device ?

Hello. Yes I did follow up with the second trial patient. I still don’t see any hair growth as it has been around 6 weeks since the procedure when I saw him last (a week ago). I will promise to share photos here. I have a presentation about it this Thursday so I’m actually trying to finish the presentation 😅

I will update you with photos once I’m done with it. 🙏🏻

[Nikoni]

35 minutes ago, DrTBarghouthi said:

Hello. Yes I did follow up with the second trial patient. I still don’t see any hair growth as it has been around 6 weeks since the procedure when I saw him last (a week ago). I will promise to share photos here. I have a presentation about it this Thursday so I’m actually trying to finish the presentation 😅

I will update you with photos once I’m done with it. 🙏🏻

Thank you Doctor that you find time to answer within the busy schedule.

[Dragonsphere]

14 hours ago, DrTBarghouthi said:

Hello. Yes I did follow up with the second trial patient. I still don’t see any hair growth as it has been around 6 weeks since the procedure when I saw him last (a week ago). I will promise to share photos here. I have a presentation about it this Thursday so I’m actually trying to finish the presentation 😅

I will update you with photos once I’m done with it. 🙏🏻

Thanks again for the update Doctor. 
The patient who wished to remain anonymous, would you say that their results so far are following a similar trajectory to the last case? 

Obviously we can't make any assumptions as Melvin has stated, but it would be great to know that there has been some uniformity in the cases. 

Edited May 13 by Dragonsphere

[Ricco]

While it's not definitively true that vert could eliminate the need for top surgeons, I understand the perspective being presented.

Even if we were to achieve the dream of 100% donor regeneration, the complexity of a good surgery would remain unchanged. Donor depletion is just one factor among many that make a surgery successful.

It would be like dermal fillers – somehow reversible, but still challenging to correct after a bad procedure. 

Melvin's mention of 25% regeneration at best doesn't make sense to me either. I respectfully disagree with his viewpoint.

Any speculation about the percentage of regeneration seems premature and somewhat pointless at this stage, in my opinion. What truly matters is confirming that the mechanism of action works. Once that's established, fine-tuning and measuring results are a separate discussion altogether. After all, Considering vert's mechanism of action, even a small percentage of regeneration suggests the possibility of significantly higher levels through multiple sessions.

That's why I believe someone mentioned that if we regenerate 25%, we might be able to achieve 100% as well.

Anyway let’s give Dr. B some space. Whenever he has some results to show , he'll share them. Let's stay calm and patient.

[Al - Moderator]

I'm reading some of these comments about how verteporfin will end the need for top Drs and that makes no sense to me at all. You're going to go to a clinic that can't design a hair line correctly, can't transplant at correct angles, takes 3000 punches just to get 1000 grafts, etc yet you think it's fine as long as they can use verteporfin to regrow the donor? Why? 

But another thing I'm thinking that I don't think has been mentioned (it may have been. There's a LOT of comments here!) is that if they have been doing hair transplants for a number of years and still don't care enough about the patient to do it right, then how can you trust them to administer verteporfin correctly? Do you really think they will just suddenly be the best in the world at using verteporfin? I read the comment about a Dr (can't remember who) who said he has been using verteporfin on lots of patients. Do we really believe that? How do you know? They can tell you anything. How do you know they aren't going to just stick your donor with a few needles at the end and say they used verteporfin on you? We see plenty of hair mills that say they transplanted 3000 or 4000 grafts yet when the patient posts here it looks more like maybe 500 or 1000 grafts. I don't see anything getting better from those types of clinics if verteporfin is proven to work and ends up being a standard in hair transplants. You're still going to have the cheap low quality clinics lying to you just as they do now. 

 

[Rasputin]

On 5/11/2024 at 3:37 PM, Fox243 said:

Sorry, not trying to refer to any individual. Just was commenting more generally that it would be amazing if we could keep spreading the word and persisting. Most docs don't read the forum, so all the time we spend back and forth here isn't as productive.

I understand what you mean, I didn't want to sound harsh. I think I might be just really wanting for this to work, like we all do.

But also I never type here to ask all the time for updates, which can obviously sound annoying. I understand the impatience / frustration of some.

[Rasputin]

On 5/13/2024 at 12:11 PM, Al - Moderator said:

I'm reading some of these comments about how verteporfin will end the need for top Drs and that makes no sense to me at all. You're going to go to a clinic that can't design a hair line correctly, can't transplant at correct angles, takes 3000 punches just to get 1000 grafts, etc yet you think it's fine as long as they can use verteporfin to regrow the donor? Why? 

But another thing I'm thinking that I don't think has been mentioned (it may have been. There's a LOT of comments here!) is that if they have been doing hair transplants for a number of years and still don't care enough about the patient to do it right, then how can you trust them to administer verteporfin correctly? Do you really think they will just suddenly be the best in the world at using verteporfin? I read the comment about a Dr (can't remember who) who said he has been using verteporfin on lots of patients. Do we really believe that? How do you know? They can tell you anything. How do you know they aren't going to just stick your donor with a few needles at the end and say they used verteporfin on you? We see plenty of hair mills that say they transplanted 3000 or 4000 grafts yet when the patient posts here it looks more like maybe 500 or 1000 grafts. I don't see anything getting better from those types of clinics if verteporfin is proven to work and ends up being a standard in hair transplants. You're still going to have the cheap low quality clinics lying to you just as they do now. 

 

This is true that patients have all to gain to go to top tier surgeon using Verteporfin instead of low quality clinics.

But at the end of the day, when we finally know more about Verteporfin, and if it's a benefit, it's up to the top surgeons to decide to use it or not. If they don't, I wouldn't understand why, if it's beneficial.

And if they do, then people still going to hair mills would only have themselves to blame if something turns out bad. We still need to name these clinics and do our "part", meaning make sure less and less people go to these places.

Just like it's important to, if Verteporfin works, make the best surgeons use it, and if they don't, try to understand their reason for not doing so (obviously IF the drug has been proven to work)

Edited May 14 by Rasputin

[geo111]

Hello,

 

I have been watching this forum since it was created. First of all, cheers to Dr. Barghouthi for his effort. I think his contribution to the hair restoration industry is huge. I was wondering if Dr. Barghouthi has plans to use verteporfin not only in the donor area but also in the recipient area after the transplantation of hair follicles in order to accelerate healing and increase the survival of grafts.

 

Thanks

 

[TV_on_LazerDisk]

On 5/9/2024 at 4:08 PM, Rasputin said:

Verteporfin doesn't regenerate hair at all then since it hasn't been proven yet, that's why we are conducting the trials.

The aim is to find the right dosage to regenerate as much as we can, not only 25%. If we can only do that, then so be it. If it's 5, 10, 20% then it's better than nothing.
 

But why 25%? We have to hope for more. Hoping is not claiming it will. Being positive is not being delusional. If it regenerates hair, then why wouldn't it regenerates all hair? That would be the next step, if we can prove first that it indeed regenerates hair.

And no, as you can see on many comments, many people WOULD chose Zarev / Ahmad if they were cheaper. But they don't because they don't want to pay for this price.

I see people holding off their surgeries because they want to see how far Verteporfin can go. Including me. I had a surgery booked with Dr Pittella which I cancelled JUST because of Verteporfin. I like Dr Pittella's work a lot. But as you can see "people who go to" won't necessary "go to" if Verteporfin is part of the equation. I speak for myself here, OK, but I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one.

The next step is also optimization maybe with hgh, certain peptides etc...it can generate more. Certain injuries hgh is prescribed to aid in recovery.

[LandWhale]

To everybody who is trying to rationalize why it definitely should work, just remember that the experiments won't care if Melvin said that the previous regeneration was 100% or if he said that it won't work at all. I know it sounds obvious, but it's important to remember that science is the ultimate dictator here, not expectations or opinions.

[Rasputin]

14 hours ago, LandWhale said:

To everybody who is trying to rationalize why it definitely should work, just remember that the experiments won't care if Melvin said that the previous regeneration was 100% or if he said that it won't work at all. I know it sounds obvious, but it's important to remember that science is the ultimate dictator here, not expectations or opinions.

What about the experiment on mice and pig?

I don't remember if it did regenerate a certain percentage of hair specifically or different results randomly?

[LandWhale]

1 hour ago, Rasputin said:

What about the experiment on mice and pig?

I don't remember if it did regenerate a certain percentage of hair specifically or different results randomly?

As far as I remember – and I could be wrong here – the skin regeneration was close to 100% in mice, but the preliminary findings in pigs showed 50-80% hair regeneration with skin which was something between a scar and normal skin (closer to normal skin though).

[Fox243]

22 minutes ago, LandWhale said:

As far as I remember – and I could be wrong here – the skin regeneration was close to 100% in mice, but the preliminary findings in pigs showed 50-80% hair regeneration with skin which was something between a scar and normal skin (closer to normal skin though).

That isn't true. They just noticed the start of hair appendages forming at 4 months for pigs, but didn't track anything beyond that. No mention of what happened to those appendages or what percent of original hair would grow.

[LandWhale]

15 minutes ago, Fox243 said:

That isn't true. They just noticed the start of hair appendages forming at 4 months for pigs, but didn't track anything beyond that. No mention of what happened to those appendages or what percent of original hair would grow.

Thank you for clarifying that. I guess I got the 50% number for pigs from this post, but this was from a YAP inhibitor (not Verteporfin).

Edited May 16 by LandWhale

[Nikoni]

4 hours ago, LandWhale said:

As far as I remember – and I could be wrong here – the skin regeneration was close to 100% in mice, but the preliminary findings in pigs showed 50-80% hair regeneration with skin which was something between a scar and normal skin (closer to normal skin though).

No one measured percentage. In mice however they couldn't tell apart the regenerated skin from normal skin, which means the regeneration was close to 100%.

In pigs they saw significant improvement before killing them at month 4. The skin was still recovering and they suggested that it would improve if pigs are not killed. No percentage mentioned.