Hair Restoration Blog

Q:

My question is based on a hair transplant that wasn’t successful.  I received a hair transplant at [blocked hair transplant clinic name] and my hair never grew in the area and I followed all the directions carefully. Is there any other solutions to bring back my hair?
A:

The survival of transplanted hair is usually a concern among the patients who undergo hair restoration.  Transplanted hair might never grow or have suboptimal growth in several conditions.  We can categories those into two major groups:  1. Technical problem and 2. Patient factor.

• Hair Transplant Technical Problems:

  • Hair graft preparation and handling problems:  inexperienced technicians may manipulate hair grafts more than what they can tolerate.  That may damage the proliferated follicle cells during slivering, graft harvesting or implanting so the transplanted hair can never grow.
  • Graft maintenance problems:  Hair follicles should be kept in suitable physiologic solutions from the moment they are removed from body till the time that they are placed in their destination.  The temperature of the solution should always be kept between 0 - 4 degree Centigrade to lower the cell metabolism and prolong the longevity of follicular cells.
  • Problems during implantation phase:  If the sites are too tight, technicians may manipulate hair grafts too much that may affect the final potential of hair cells to grow.

• Patient Factors:

  • Many skin conditions may restrict or stop the growth of transplanted hair.  Some of those conditions are Alopecia Areata, Alopecia Cicatricial and many other medical conditions that may have caused hair loss in the first place.  Preoperative microscopic and macroscopic evaluation of hair and scalp is crucial to rule out any condition that may limit the growth of transplanted hair.  Hair transplant surgeons should raise questions for these in atypical hair loss conditions especially in patients who do not have a family history of similar hair loss condition.  The diagnosis should be confirmed by scalp biopsy.
  • Care after hair transplant play a major role in the final results of a hair transplant procedure.  Physical trauma to the transplanted hair may cause losing newly transplanted hair, including pulling hair, scratching head or psychological conditions such as trichotillomania in which patient pull hair due to an obsessive compulsive disorder.

If you experienced less than desirable results from your hair transplant surgery after one year from your hair transplant surgery, you need to see a good hair transplant surgeon to reevaluate your condition and potentially treat the disorder that has caused your less than desirable growth.

Tags: alopecia areata, alopecia cicatricial, care after hair transplant, good hair transplant doctor, hair transplant, Trichotillomania

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 15th, 2009 at 8:43 pm and is filed under complications, hair loss, hair transplant surgery. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.