Hair Norwood And Age

[HairEnthusiast101]

This was more of a curiosity question because I’ve always believed hair loss wasn’t  determined as fast…on realself I saw a doctor say that norwoods to a degree are determined in teens to 20-30 range and that if you are not Norwood 5 during this point then it would be rare to ever reach Norwood 7. How true is this? Like if you maintain Norwood 3 throughout 20s and are on medical maintenance will you almost certainly stay near Norwood 3 throughout your life? Probably a bad question but that is how I interrupted the answer on realself!

Edited December 1, 2022 by JoDimaggio22

[Doron Harati]

Somewhere around late 20's - early 30's (some occasions mid 20's), a doctor can predict what will be the final Norwood pattern of the paitent, usually yes NW7 potential you can see on early mid 20's paitents, meds usually used by NW2-5 and some NW6 to preserve the donor from diffused hair.

[HairEnthusiast101]

56 minutes ago, Doron Harati said:

Somewhere around late 20's - early 30's (some occasions mid 20's), a doctor can predict what will be the final Norwood pattern of the paitent, usually yes NW7 potential you can see on early mid 20's paitents, meds usually used by NW2-5 and some NW6 to preserve the donor from diffused hair.

Ah okay. So a NW3 at 28 rarely gets to NW7? And fin mainly helps crown  instead of hairline so if that NW3 wasn’t vertex and used fin for life they would more likely than not keep their crown intact?

[Gatsby]

The one problem is that the younger a person's hair loss is determined then the less knowledge their is of how their donor will be in the years ahead. A somewhat excellent donor at 25 may not be so excellent at 35 - 40.

[Rahal Hair Transplant]

@JoDimaggio22,

I think blanket statements like the above are a bit dangerous however, I would agree that most people with advanced balding are at higher Norwood levels by age 30. Of course, that doesn’t mean that one can’t experience hair loss or Advanced bowling later in life. But, It does seem to be true that the best majority of hair loss suffering men lose most of their hair between 20 and 30 years old.

I hope this helps 

Rahal Hair Transplant 

[HairEnthusiast101]

1 hour ago, Rahal Hair Transplant said:

@JoDimaggio22,

I think blanket statements like the above are a bit dangerous however, I would agree that most people with advanced balding are at higher Norwood levels by age 30. Of course, that doesn’t mean that one can’t experience hair loss or Advanced bowling later in life. But, It does seem to be true that the best majority of hair loss suffering men lose most of their hair between 20 and 30 years old.

I hope this helps 

Rahal Hair Transplant 

I agree doctor Rahal and team! I was just shocked because I always believed hair loss was progressive so when I saw a doctor say that it can be determined fairly well in your 20-30s which Norwood you’ll end at it kind of caught me off guard!

[Mike10]

10 hours ago, Doron Harati said:

Somewhere around late 20's - early 30's (some occasions mid 20's), a doctor can predict what will be the final Norwood pattern of the paitent, usually yes NW7 potential you can see on early mid 20's paitents, meds usually used by NW2-5 and some NW6 to preserve the donor from diffused hair.

Sorry but this is nonsense

[Mike10]

11 hours ago, JoDimaggio22 said:

This was more of a curiosity question because I’ve always believed hair loss wasn’t  determined as fast…on realself I saw a doctor say that norwoods to a degree are determined in teens to 20-30 range and that if you are not Norwood 5 during this point then it would be rare to ever reach Norwood 7. How true is this? Like if you maintain Norwood 3 throughout 20s and are on medical maintenance will you almost certainly stay near Norwood 3 throughout your life? Probably a bad question but that is how I interrupted the answer on realself!

Real self is a joke. This is just dangerous and misleading. No reputable would estimate your final NW pattern in the age range 20-30. 

[Mike10]

I did viisit 5 reputable HT Drs and ask them this question.I am barely a NW 2 in my 40s. I only have some corner recession and otherwise excellent hair density. 

Now of those 5 Drs, only 2 woudl them would take an educated guess. Now figure I am in my 40s!  those 2 did estimate a final NW3 pattern taking into account a broad range of factors such as hair denisty, dono capicity, miniturizatioon mapping, pics of past hair loss history, family history. And they also cautioned that this is the most likely scenario and not a certainty. 

[HairEnthusiast101]

10 minutes ago, Mike10 said:

Real self is a joke. This is just dangerous and misleading. No reputable would estimate your final NW pattern in the age range 20-30. 

Ya that is kind of what I thought. They didn’t say it determined the final but basically that you would stay fairly close to that same Norwood and not advance much past. What I got out of it was a Norwood 7 is basically a Norwood 5-6 before they are 30

[HairEnthusiast101]

2 minutes ago, Mike10 said:

I did viisit 5 reputable HT Drs and ask them this question.I am barely a NW 2 in my 40s. I only have some corner recession and otherwise excellent hair density. 

Now of those 5 Drs, only 2 woudl them would take an educated guess. Now figure I am in my 40s!  those 2 did estimate a final NW3 pattern taking into account a broad range of factors such as hair denisty, dono capicity, miniturizatioon mapping, pics of past hair loss history, family history. And they also cautioned that this is the most likely scenario and not a certainty. 

Very interesting. The reason I was curious  is because 1) this site is full of very smart individuals when it comes to Hair. 2) I am about a Norwood 3 in my later 20s so was curious if I would stay around that for most of my life(I use finasteride daily) or if it was still possible I could go Norwood 5+.

Edited December 1, 2022 by JoDimaggio22

[Mike10]

6 minutes ago, JoDimaggio22 said:

Very interesting. The reason I was curious  is because 1) this site is full of very smart individuals when it comes to Hair. 2) I am about a Norwood 3 in my later 20s so was curious if I would stay around that for most of my life(I use finasteride daily) or if it was still possible I could go Norwood 5+.

I am not on medication. But if Finansteride works well you may remain a NW3 for the next  let's say 20 year or so. Estimating a final NW pattern is whole different beast though. At higher age there is aging alopecia which is  less DHT related. People tend to lose really more hair again in the higher age (above 65)

Edited December 1, 2022 by Mike10

[HairEnthusiast101]

16 minutes ago, Mike10 said:

I am not on medication. But if Finansteride works well you may remain a NW3 for the next  let's say 20 year or so. Estimating a final NW pattern is whole different beast though. At higher age there is aging alopecia which is  less DHT related. People tend to lose really more hair again in the higher age (above 65)

Very true. I have noticed that with my parents who are older than 65. They both had pretty good hair before then. It would be cool to know exactly what happens long term but hey In your 40s with an NW2 is pretty dang good. Finasteride by no means is a for certain but as long as I can keep my crown then I’m okay with losing my forelock and frontal area! My biggest worry is I get a hair transplant and the hair transplanted begins to thin over time. At that point going bald would be best

[HappyMan2021]

You can't rely on relatives to determine hair loss, that has been proven time and time again. 

It doesn't take a doctor to determine the correlation between Norwood level, age, future hair loss, etc. 

A 35 yr old NW3 has less aggressive hair loss than a 25 yr old NW 5 - don't need a medical degree for that 🤣

[Mike10]

On 12/1/2022 at 11:25 PM, HappyMan2021 said:

You can't rely on relatives to determine hair loss, that has been proven time and time again. 

It doesn't take a doctor to determine the correlation between Norwood level, age, future hair loss, etc. 

A 35 yr old NW3 has less aggressive hair loss than a 25 yr old NW 5 - don't need a medical degree for that 🤣

I think  it is better to go to a reputable Drs. They have long term experience with patients and the technical tools to measure hair density. Because when it comes to hair loss there is a lot of wishful thinking involved and a lot of guys make stupid decisions

[Vann]

Honestly the only time I think someone can say what norwood your guaranteed to be is if its NW7. If youre 20-25 and already have lots of hair loss it would be best to assume they will have very little to work with. Its extremely difficult to judge how people will proceed. 

Not all people lose their hair at the same pace. It could be extremely aggressive in your early/late twenties and slow down when you hit your mid thirties then pick up. DHT works differently as we age and our hair is still sensitive to a certain threshold. 

I think if you take medications you can stabilize and perhaps predict how you will hold as you age. But you will still lose ground over time, its unfortunately a biological process that we cannot control 100%.

[HairEnthusiast101]

16 hours ago, Vann said:

Honestly the only time I think someone can say what norwood your guaranteed to be is if its NW7. If youre 20-25 and already have lots of hair loss it would be best to assume they will have very little to work with. Its extremely difficult to judge how people will proceed. 

Not all people lose their hair at the same pace. It could be extremely aggressive in your early/late twenties and slow down when you hit your mid thirties then pick up. DHT works differently as we age and our hair is still sensitive to a certain threshold. 

I think if you take medications you can stabilize and perhaps predict how you will hold as you age. But you will still lose ground over time, its unfortunately a biological process that we cannot control 100%.

Very true vann. I take finasteride but I’ve heard it doesn’t work as well on your frontal third compared to crown. As long as I can keep my crown I will be happy. I was just curious if lifelong fin mixed with aging could cause minimal hair loss throughout my life or genetically will I end up 3-4 norwoods higher regardless. 

[Vann]

2 minutes ago, JoDimaggio22 said:

Very true vann. I take finasteride but I’ve heard it doesn’t work as well on your frontal third compared to crown. As long as I can keep my crown I will be happy. I was just curious if lifelong fin mixed with aging could cause minimal hair loss throughout my life or genetically will I end up 3-4 norwoods higher regardless. 

That’s the magic question. You could completely stop it in its tracks if you’re a lucky responder (someone whose follicles are strong against dht but has a higher level of it) or someone who is extremely sensitive at any level of dht regardless of how much. 
 

fin could improve for you over time as you take it. But you may still lose ground.
 

It’s really annoying that we can’t do anything further to improve our situation more than what we have at this moment. But there are a lot of researchers funded/backed by billionaires looking to improve the quality of life in a person. So adjunct to that some form of accident may find a solution for us progressively balding soldiers. 

[HairEnthusiast101]

Just now, Vann said:

That’s the magic question. You could completely stop it in its tracks if you’re a lucky responder (someone whose follicles are strong against dht but has a higher level of it) or someone who is extremely sensitive at any level of dht regardless of how much. 
 

fin could improve for you over time as you take it. But you may still lose ground.
 

It’s really annoying that we can’t do anything further to improve our situation more than what we have at this moment. But there are a lot of researchers funded/backed by billionaires looking to improve the quality of life in a person. So adjunct to that some form of accident may find a solution for us progressively balding soldiers. 

I hope so. I don’t like using topicals as much due to the irritation they give me but I’ve see pyrilumatide? As something that seems promising soon. Either way my worry is finasteride loses its strength over time and I have to up the dose 10 years from now or go another route

[Vann]

7 minutes ago, JoDimaggio22 said:

I hope so. I don’t like using topicals as much due to the irritation they give me but I’ve see pyrilumatide? As something that seems promising soon. Either way my worry is finasteride loses its strength over time and I have to up the dose 10 years from now or go another route

I don’t know if finasteride loses its potency. I’ve seen research show it improves with time and slows down due to age. This could Be a number of things like less testosterone being produced in the body or a number of other factors. It’s honestly difficult to say exactly.

if you feel like you are losing ground look into dutasteride 0.5 mg it blocks 2 inhibitors. 
 

but increasing the dose does not correlate with making it more effective. A lot of people here believe 0.25-0.5mg fin work wonders for them on a 3-7 day basis. Some people respond well to 1-1.25 mg and believe that’s what works best for them.

I personally think if you respond well to fin then you should add dut so you maximize as much dht blockage as possible but of course to whatever you ‘tolerate’

i also agree I don’t like topicals much either my skin gets irritated and dry from them too.

Edited December 3, 2022 by Vann