Amount of grafts taken from a given area with FUE

[NewHare]

In FUE how many grafts are taken from a given area ?  Is there a certain percentage that can be safely taken ?

Can they remove say up to 50% or so ?   I'm trying to get a basic idea of what I can expect.

[Rafael Manelli]

The question is too imprecise. It depends. Which area? What’s the goal? What’s the hair texture?

If you take too much, the donor will look sparse and see through and we call that “overharvesting”.

Some men can afford to lose only 30% of their donor before looking thin. Men with thick, curly hair and high density can afford to lose more.

Dr Zarev extracts as much as 80% of the donor, apparently. That is practically unheard of, and sounds insane for FUE. He must be very selective about his patients, or they end up with noticeable donor thinning . But for some, it is worth it to have a thin donor if it enables a thicker recipient.

 

[Doron Harati]

Depending on the quality of the donor, every case should be treated individually with personal care and with not fixed formula.

Pro level clinic can estimate max grafts potential without overharvesting the donor.

[Hairwise1]

5 hours ago, Doron Harati said:

Depending on the quality of the donor, every case should be treated individually with personal care and with not fixed formula.

Pro level clinic can estimate max grafts potential without overharvesting the donor.

What Doron says is correct.

Another important factor is that at HDC Hair Clinic we distribute our punching evenly over the donor and always leaving surrounding hair around the punched follicles. Also, we do not punch deep into the skin thus creating less scarring. By punching deep, it is easier to extract and is the only way to finish a 4000 grafts FUE case in 1 day as it happens with the low-cost clinics. We take 2 days for a 4000 graft FUE Hair Transplant, so that we safeguard donor health.

You can see more information on donor management on one of our patient's post,  on this link. 

 

[NewHare]

I recall reading that balding becomes 'noticeable' when the person passes the +/- 50% loss mark. 

Given that, I was wondering if that same principle would apply to the donor.  I thought somewhere between 30-50% would be a good guesstimate.  At least until I'm actually able to get to a doc and get an accurate assessment.

Who are the top FUE docs in the U.S. ?  

[WhereIsMyMind]

When I had my surgery with dr Mwamba he told me with the pattern extraction method they use, they go for 40% of graft removed from targeted donor. This means, if you have 10K donor available, he will take 4K. This leaves you with 6K, which can be repeated in another FUE for another 2.4K. As you can see, if you want a pattern that is close to undetectable, it has diminishing returns. But a donor with 10-14k follicles can easily yield 6-9k graft with good results.

I would say without any donor reconstruction getting more than 60% of grafts out will start being very noticeable.

Edited March 17, 2023 by WhereIsMyMind

[NewHare]

On 3/17/2023 at 4:50 PM, WhereIsMyMind said:

When I had my surgery with dr Mwamba he told me with the pattern extraction method they use, they go for 40% of graft removed from targeted donor. This means, if you have 10K donor available, he will take 4K. This leaves you with 6K, which can be repeated in another FUE for another 2.4K. As you can see, if you want a pattern that is close to undetectable, it has diminishing returns. But a donor with 10-14k follicles can easily yield 6-9k graft with good results.

I would say without any donor reconstruction getting more than 60% of grafts out will start being very noticeable.

 

Thanks WhereIsMyMind,  your post was very helpful.

 

 

 

[Dillpickle123]

You can also take a lot and do donor reconstruction where they put beard or body hair where grafts were taken from

[NewHare]

20 hours ago, Dillpickle123 said:

You can also take a lot and do donor reconstruction where they put beard or body hair where grafts were taken from

Thanks Dill,

What would be the benefits of this as opposed to just using beard or body hair grafts along with donor straight into the recipient area ?  

[Dillpickle123]

26 minutes ago, NewHare said:

Thanks Dill,

What would be the benefits of this as opposed to just using beard or body hair grafts along with donor straight into the recipient area ?  

Because the beard and body hair “replaces” the scalp hair by placing something in the hole of where it was fue out and since the beard donor heals better then scalp donor ppl opt to do that as beard donor doenst leave much scarring 

[Dillpickle123]

Also beard hair can’t be used in the hairline 

[WhereIsMyMind]

16 hours ago, NewHare said:

Thanks Dill,

What would be the benefits of this as opposed to just using beard or body hair grafts along with donor straight into the recipient area ?  

I had this done actually. Despite Mwamba telling me I could only get 40% out of my donor, he ended up taking 60% because the other 20% was replaced with beard hair.

Main rationale is that my beard hair is 3x times thicker in caliber than scalp hair, and I would rather risk donor look less natural than scalp. When kept short, beard hair vs scalp hair is indistuingable, but for very long hair, beard hair can be very noticeable, also, beard heard tends to become grey faster with age and i'd also rather have grey hair on donor and not on top.

Personally, I would only have scalp hair on my top. But if you think your beard hair is very similar to scalp hair going the direct route also makes sense.

Edited March 20, 2023 by WhereIsMyMind

[Bucky O Hair]

On 3/16/2023 at 8:04 PM, NewHare said:

In FUE how many grafts are taken from a given area ?  Is there a certain percentage that can be safely taken ?

Can they remove say up to 50% or so ?   I'm trying to get a basic idea of what I can expect.

In general terms, I have both read (and was told) that you can harvest ONE THIRD of your donor to avoid it looking like you've overharvested it.

However, I've seen quite a few cases on here where people with thin donor hair are extracting half of their donor area hairs, and their donor area in their postop photos looks fine.

I assume ONE THIRD is the safe estimate that will keep you in the clear...but if you go more than that, it just gets riskier and results will vary from person to person.

 

Hey, worst case...you can always use SMP to mask donor hair scarring and gaps 

 

Edited March 20, 2023 by Bucky O Hair

[NewHare]

Thanks for the advice and insight guys.  Are there any beard/body hair surgeons located in the states ?

Due to constraints I'm limited to 'local' clinics.

[Melvin- Admin]

On 3/17/2023 at 6:08 AM, Hairwise1 said:

What Doron says is correct.

Another important factor is that at HDC Hair Clinic we distribute our punching evenly over the donor and always leaving surrounding hair around the punched follicles. Also, we do not punch deep into the skin thus creating less scarring. By punching deep, it is easier to extract and is the only way to finish a 4000 grafts FUE case in 1 day as it happens with the low-cost clinics. We take 2 days for a 4000 graft FUE Hair Transplant, so that we safeguard donor health.

You can see more information on donor management on one of our patient's post,  on this link. 

 

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