Dr. Feller on radio show debate with owner of Hairmax laser comb company

[maxzor]

As a fellow hairloss sufferer I think the two things we want to know is what treatments do actually work and what can we expect of these treatments.

 

I think most of us who come to this forum are fed up with products and stories claiming unrealistic results just to make some money.

So we have to be critical to new products claiming significant results. Hairloss sufferers can't just use any product that claims to be succesfull in treating MPB without seeing prove. Otherwise there are thousands of products available online, whether FDA approved whether all natural and "laboratorium" tested etc...

 

BeHappy how come you can claim that the laser brush is working great so far by just using the brush for over 2 months. Are you using other hairloss products that could contribute to the results... Untill this moment I haven't seen any proven hair loss treatment achieve great results within such a short notice.

[MrJobi]

My whole problem with Laser therapy is whenever the "credible" sources speak about it, they have no solid evidence it works?? This is no offense to Behappy of course but we have people on here who claim standing on your head,massaging the scalp, or saw palmetto will assist in hairloss

 

If it is so damn good why arent there hundreds of photos from legit sources.. It's all very very shady

[giants]

BeHappy 2 questions

 

1. Are your on rogaine and/or propecia and if so for how long.

 

2. Do you have any before and after pictures

[NervousNelly]

Oh Boy. Possibly someone or some people do get results. Maybe it is the slightest of percentage of users getting some results from lasers, massage, standing on head or snake oils but what the hell. Only 1 in 250 million or so wins the Powerball lotto but I still buy a ticket.

 

Okay--due to the fact that there is no scietific proof of efficacy of many of the alternatives we should probably never endorse to other members. I'll agree with that statement, but I don't understand why some continue to take such a hard stance with statement like "I tried it and it did nothing, that shit don't work". What is the harm in someone trying something that won't harm them or costs very little? Maybe they will win the lottery. Jackpot-more hair. What the hell.

 

NN

[NervousNelly]

I was going to save this for another thread but the topic is relevant so...

 

I had a certain regimine after my HT to attempt to keep the grafts and not shed. I was taking Vit. A, Vit. E, MSM, Rogaine foam (1*day), Laser therapy, inversion table(after 2 weeks), Propecia every 3 days. I am currently at 9 weeks and I definitely retained over 20% of my grafts--hard to know so I guessed low to be conservative. Probably more like 30-35%. Do I have photos for proof? I guess I could add some, but I don't believe that they will or could possibly be detailed enough to show adequate proof because I have native hair. Therefor there is no point if the pics are not going to validate my statement. I guess you can choose to believe or not and if interested you can PM me for more info. We'll leave it at that.

 

NN

 

P.S. I had e-mailed Nobuzz and Behappy with my regimine when I started to attempt to make it somewhat of a valid study.

[Al - Moderator]

1. Are your on rogaine and/or propecia and if so for how long?

 

The only other things I use are propecia (actually proscar) and nizoral 1% shampoo. I've been using both for many years and haven't used anything else the entire time. I've been trying to cut down on proscar the last few years. The laser comb has let me drop down to taking it only 2 to 3 days a week without getting any sebum buildup.

 

 

2. Do you have any before and after pictures?

 

Not yet. It's only just starting to get to a noticeable improvement point without actually inspecting my hair closely.

 

 

3. How can you can claim that the laser brush is working great so far by just using the brush for over 2 months. I haven't seen any proven hair loss treatment achieve great results within such a short notice.

 

First of all it depends on how you interpret great. I say that with the perspective that I've only been using a few months. I didn't suddenly get a full head of hair (although I hope I eventually do!).

 

Prior to my laser comb useage I always had some fine hairs that would start growing and then fall out after a few weeks when they reached 1/4 inch or so in length. A few of these have grown into more permanent hairs over the years and I attribute that to the proscar and nizoral use. However even those new permanent hairs are very thin wispy hairs. Those fine hairs I had was one reason I thought I might be a good candidate for laser therapy because it supposedly at least lets your existing hairs grow better and thicker.

 

Once I started using the laser comb what I did NOT get is an initial shedding like rogaine and sometimes propecia can cause. Instead some of the short fine hairs that would have fallen out after a few weeks kept growing. Some did fall out, but I think that's expected since some would have been at the point of being ready to fall out anyway. Hopefully the next cycle will get more of them to grow longer. So the fact that the short fine hairs continued growing gave me a slight, but almost immediate (in 1 to 2 months time) improvement at least as far as close examination goes. To me this is very encouraging.

 

The areas that are improving the most are the crown and back of my head and the temples. At this point (a little over 2.5 months of use) there is now a definite noticeable improvement and increased amount of growing hairs in the back of my head.

 

Something that I really found interesting (and pleasantly surprising) is the scarred donor areas from all the HTs I went through years ago. I had a scarred area that would only grow some sparse scraggly hair, sort of like beard hair. Using the laser comb in that area has straightened the hair out and increased the amount of hair growing there. The scars in that section are partly covered now. I'm very pleased with that!

 

I think that's enough for now. If you think of any other questions I'll try to answer. Please realize that I'm still early on and I'm not fully recommending a laser comb yet. I'll wait for at least another few months before I'm willing to say that. I can only hope my hair continues to improve. I don't know where or when the improvement will stop.

[Al - Moderator]

Originally posted by Mrjb:

My whole problem with Laser therapy is whenever the "credible" sources speak about it, they have no solid evidence it works

 

If it is so damn good why arent there hundreds of photos from legit sources

 

I tried to address this in an earlier post, but maybe it didn't come across well.

 

The "credible" sources are using laser helmet type devices in their office with patients making twice a week visits that cost thousands of dollars for a few months. how long do you think anyone is going to continue that useage?

 

The "non credible" sources are home users with hand held laser combs that they use almost daily. In the 2.5 months I've been using mine I think I missed only 2 days. There's very little cost involved. I can easily do this for several years if it works.

 

It stands to reason that the "credible" sources are going to have the worst results of the 2 groups.

 

So who is going to do a real study? The "credible" sources aren't going to be able to show decent results because their patients are only using it twice a week. You can't get decent results on most people with only twice a week useage. Don't you think they know that?

 

OK, so what about the laser comb manufacturers?

Lexington already did that and submitted it to the FDA. Look at what the price of their comb is compared to others. Lexington comb is $395 for the cheap model and $545 for the premium. Compare that to $79 for the cheap model and $119 for the best model from the company I bought mine.

 

Now that the FDA has approved it, whether you want to argue or not what that approval means, it's selling laser combs. There's no point in doing another study that will only raise your price and make yours more expensive than the competition who also benefits from your study.

 

Drug companies are different. They get x amount of years of exclusive rights to sell the drug, so it pays to do studies plus they aren't allowed to sell a drug unless they do those studies.

 

 

This is my personal opinion on the subject.

[Al - Moderator]

Thought of something to add to my above post.

 

If the laser comb has been around for years why hasn't there been more decent results?

 

Lexington's web site says their older laser combs had only 1 real laser. What I understand they did was used mirrors to reflect the laser light into several beams, so it acted like 6 or so laser beams. The problem with that is light reflected multiple times loses it's power. So while todays combs use the same mw power lasers as the older combs, the actual power hitting your scalp is more than it was in older combs. This will result in better results of growth.

 

In other words, laser combs of just a few years ago threw the laser light onto your head after bouncing it off of a mirror. Todays combs the lasers are more focused.

 

Compare it to older hair transplants. You will have a really hard time finding anyone who had a good result from a HT 15 or 20 years ago, but it's pretty common to find people with decent results today even though the basic technique is still the same as always. They take hair from one area of your head and move it to another area. However it's been refined over the years to give you individual hairs where you need them to get a much better result.