Hair Restoration Blog

Q:

Hey Doctor Mohebi,

I was wondering, I’m thinking about getting a hair transplant, but I’m afraid of telling my future wife and female friends that I’ve had a hair restoration. I know men may not care that much, but if I’m dating someone and eventually I tell them I’ve gotten a hair transplant, I fear that they may get turned off.

I kind of look at it like plastic surgery. I know when I meet women who has undergone a nose job, I kind of feel strange about it and think maybe that person was not happy with their looks.
To be honest, it  turns me off.

So, my question is: from your experience with patients, do they keep it a secret from others or do they not mind telling people?

A:

Today, we have capabilities we did not have 50 years ago. As a young soccer lover, I used to have the disadvantage of wearing glasses.  It was very difficult for me to stay competitive in succer team without wearing my glasses.  Every now and then, I use contact lenses to be able to put aside my glasses. I am planning to get a LASIK procedure for that as well.

If I undergo a LASIK procedure, does it make me an insecure person. Not at all. I call it using all your resources to look your best.

We do have technology that we did not have 10 years ago. I say: why not use it? A lot of people are doing it, and nobody cares if these peoples’ hair is native hair or transplanted. The point: they are not bald any more and they can be as competitive as their non bald rivals in life.

One time, I met a very beautiful woman at a party and I ended up having a conversation with her.  When I told her I do hair transplants, she told me a story about someone who proposed to her and she rejected him. She said the man was bald. But I’m not saying because he was bald that he got rejected, but because he did not do anything about it. I know the argument can be made that what the woman did is sad and superficial but, hey, looks do play a part in initial courtship, whether we would like to admit it or not. And it was her prerogative to make that decision.

My point is: Be yourself and do whatever makes your heart happy. No matter what you do with your life, there are going to be people who may not like it. It should not influence your decisions.

Q:

When I do look down placing more tension or pull on the tight donor area, I noticed it is also pulling my neck muscles and there is no laxity at all (compared to the right).  There is no up or down movement possible of any subcutaneous tissue or the galea at the donor site. Is this normal? If the tightness does not subside, what solution options are there?

I also understand there are recommended scalp exercises before and after HT surgeries?

Regards,

A:

It is normal to feel tension on the side that we removed the strip.  Skin needs a few weeks to get relaxed and stretches to compensate for the removed area.  Although we generally recommend scalp exercise before hair restoration surgeries with strip technique, you should avoid scalp exercise after hair transplant for the first 3 or 4 months.

I recommend that you avoid all movements that increase the tension in the area until you feel that the tension on the skin is gone.  If you put too much stretch on the back of your head in the first few months after hair transplant, you running the risk of stretching the donor scar.

Have a good weekend.

Q:

Dr. Mohebi, my next follow up appointment with you for 10 months follow up is scheduled in early January. I am very pleased with the results of my hair transplant, at the front, but, as we had thought, we may need to do some more at the back. When is a good time to do a repeat hair restoration surgery after the first one?

With all best wishes,

A:

If you need more density on the crown, you can consider another hair transplant surgery for that area anytime after 6 months from your first hair transplant. The reason you have to wait for 6 months is because at that point you should be evaluated for the growth of the grafts from your prior hair restoration surgery and donor area. All grafts should be grown at month six after your other hair transplant. So we should be able see which areas need to be covered further. Performing another hair transplant surgery may risk putting a new graft on top of an area that is supposed to grow new hair, but the hair is not visible yet.

One time, a friend told me he was at a diversity conference and there was a man who came up to the podium to speak. He asked the audience, “what is the first thing you notice about me?” Someone yelled out, “BALDIE!” And subsequent laughter ensued (being an African American, it turned out he was hoping someone would say, “you’re black”).

Although the remark was taken as a joke, it’s unfortunate many people in our society notice physical appearances before anything else. There’s no shame whatsoever in losing one’s hair. The reality is that it’s not that person’s fault. It’s their genetic coding.

For those losing hair, there’s a socially acceptable solution: A hair transplant. Hair transplants have done wonders for all types of people, from big-name actors to prominent television sports anchors. It boosts self-confidence, makes a person feel less conspicuous in social settings, and may even increase the chance of a person landing a first date or better someone’s job prospects.

Hair transplants at US Hair Restoration are all-natural. Take a look at our hair transplant before and after photo gallery.  In a way, a hair restoration can restore your youth and help you feel at ease around people you’re meeting for the first time, making the experience of life better and more rewarding.

Much like narrowing a gap between teeth by getting braces, or correcting one’s near-sightedness by lasik eye surgery, a hair restoration can be a wonderful option for those who believe they may benefit from it.

Someone just forwarded me an interesting article from the LA Times that was recently published.  The author was visiting one of the open houses of a hair transplant surgical clinic recently and was amazed to see a good crowd despite of the current recession and financial slow down that has caused patient volume in cosmetic-surgery facilities to fall by a third, according to the American Academy of Cosmetic Surgery.  The author found a waiting room full of guys who were willing to spend as much as $20,000 a piece to restore what nature was taking away.

He says: “…increasingly these days, another incentive for men to undergo hair-transplant surgery is a desire to be more competitive in a challenging job market.”  The article quotes Dr. Rassman as: “Society discriminates against bald people. If you have two people coming in for a job, and one of them is partly bald, you’ll think that the one with hair has more youth and vitality.”  He continues as “Many full-headed people have a hard time understanding the problems of balding people.”  The author talks to several balding men requiring hair restoration information at his hair transplant clinic.  One of the patients said, a more youthful appearance would definitely improve his chances if one had to start looking for work — which he hopes won’t happen any time soon, but you never know with the way things are.

The article continues as: With hair-transplant surgery, healthy hair is removed from the back of the scalp and replanted up top.  Sometimes it grows in nice and evenly. Other times, you have to grow it long where it takes root and settle for a comb over. And other times, judging from some websites out there, things can go very wrong and you’re worse off than when you began.  Potential patients will want to shop around carefully.  Rahul Gupta, 28, works as a mechanical engineer for a company he’d rather not name.  (”We do a lot of defense work,” he explained.)  Like David, he’s mindful of how a hirsute appearance can influence one’s career prospects.

I found this article interesting and I have to say, I personally had many patients whom have visited me as soon as they heard that they are being laid off from their job.  The job market is tight now, but there are plenty of opportunities in getting what you want at a discounted rate.  For example, we came up with a standby program to help people who can be flexible with their schedules fill our openings and get discounts on their hair transplant cost.  If you are competing with a lot of qualified candidates that just lost their job, you need to use any help you can possibly get to become more competitive.

Bakersfield, California: US Hair Restoration hair transplant clinic is soon to start its activity at the city of Bakersfield in California.  Previously in this blog we went over the article “Surgeon Restores Patients’ Hair, Self-Confidence” that was recently published in the the Beverly Hills Courier.  In the article Dr. Parsa Mohebi, medical director of US Hair Restoration discusses the modern hair transplant techniques and the innovation that a perfect hair restoration is made of with the most natural results possible.

US Hair Restoration announced the opening of its hair restoration clinic in the city of Bakersfield, CA to serve Southern California, particularly the northern cities of Los Angeles such as Sacramento and Fresno and north of the San Fernando Valley.  US Hair Restoration hair transplant clinics are also accessible and being used by the residents of Las Vegas, Nevada and Phoenix, Arizona.

From Beverly Hills Courier magazine:

We all know that nothing looks better than a full head of hair, and one of the best people to provide it is Dr. Parsa Mohebi, medical director of US Hair Restoration.

Dr. Mohebi specializes in several hair-transplant procedures:

• Follicular Unit Transplant (FUT) is the gold standard of hair-transplant surgery, Mohebi said, giving very natural results. A strip of donor scalp is removed and the follicles are prepared under microscopes and distributed in the bald area in the natural direction and orientation.
• Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE), also called non-invasive hair-restoration surgery, uses special biopsy devices to extract individual follicular units without having to remove a strip of skin; so there is no linear scar.

“Not everyone needs FUE or follicular unit extractions hair transplant” Mohebi says. “But people who want to shave their head in the future for any reason may consider FUE because there is no visible evidence of surgery on the back of their head. There’s nothing to suture, and the small dot wounds are not detectable a few days after surgery”.

Since the newly placed follicles are so fragile, patients return the next day to get their hair washed professionally, given special shampoo and taught how to take care of their hair at home. “After five days, no special care is needed,” Mohebi said.

Ten days after the surgery, patients return to have the donor site checked and staples removed for those who had them. Hair starts growing after three months, and is long enough to style and comb after ten to twelve months. The third follow up is at 10 months after the procedure.Continuing to pioneer in the field, Dr. Mohebi is the inventor of the Laxometer, a device to measure the laxity or mobility of the scalp. Laxity of the scalp is key in determining the size of the donor strip so that enough can be removed for bigger cases, and the wound can be closed without too much tension and the scaring will be minimal.

US Hair Restoration has Southern California Clinics in Encino, California, Orange County, Beverly Hills and now Bakersfield.  US Hair Restoration also offers hair transplant services in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE). To help people stay abreast of all that’s happening in the field of hair restoration, and to answer questions (he’s heard from Europe and China) Dr. Mohebi maintains the hair restoration blog to answer your hair loss and hair transplant questions.

Hello,

I underwent surgery in mid-October and remember well the directive to keep the sun off my head. My question is whether I can use a tanning bed without damage or threat of damage to the transplant area if a use a bandana.

You have had your hair transplant for about two weeks now and you were wondering whether or not a tanning bed can damage your newly transplanted hair implants. What we generally recommend to our patients after hair transplant surgery at US Hair Restoration is to avoid sun exposure to the transplanted areas of the head for at least 6 months after their hair transplants. Sun exposure can slow down or stop the growth of normal, existing hair or even damage the hair follicles. The same issue may be seen with newly transplanted hair after a hair restoration surgery. Sunlight has many different components besides the visible light including ultra violet and infra red lights. We do not know for sure which components are more responsible for hair follicle damage but for this reason I prefer to treat tanning beds the same way. If you can cover your head completely to block the exposure to the light, I do not think that you have to avoid tanning beds.

Q:
I am 24 with a strong family history of hair loss in the male members at and around early 20s. Recently, I started seeing hair in my sink and on the bed that is much lighter my regular hair. Is it normal? Am I balding and can I use a hair transplant to prevent further hair loss.
A:
Male patterned hair loss is characterized with miniaturization of hair shafts before complete losing them. In genetically prone men to male pattern baldness, hairs of an affected area gradually become thinner and thinner, before they ultimately become nonexistent.

Miniaturization hair shafts make them look thinner, because of the smaller size and then the smaller amount of darker pigments that could be seen.

It seems that you started with hair loss phenomenon and you only need to get it diagnosed by a good hair specialist who can also get you started on medication treatment if need be. A miniaturization study can give you some ideas of where you are heading before starting with the medications.

I am in the Detroit airport on my way back to Los Angeles from the 16^th annual meeting of international society of hair restoration surgery (ISHRS) that was held in the beautiful city of Montreal in Canada last week. This five day meeting was filled with a variety of presentation on the clinical and basic science aspects of hair transplant surgery and medical hair restoration.

I gave a lecture on psycho-social impacts of hair restoration on men on the first day of the meeting. The lecture has been prepared based on my other article on Psychology of Hair Transplant that was previously presented and published on the Hair Transplant Forum International on April, 2008. In the current presentation on psycho social impacts of hair transplantation, I explored some other social and psychological aspect that hair transplant patients experience after their hair restoration procedures based on experience we had with our Los Angeles hair transplant patients and what we found in our research last year with New Hair Institute (NHI).

Several other interesting studies were presented on the aesthetic planning and designing of the hair line and frame of the face with hair transplantation. There were many articles on the hair transplant surgery techniques that could be used for optimization of the final appearance of a hair transplant.

Few articles were presented on hair stem cell research and hair multiplication. However based on the presented evidences, there were no signs of an upcoming solution for hair multiplication or hair cloning any time soon.

One article discussed an innovative method of hair graft harvesting that can produce more hair from an existing follicular unit. The result of this study, although interesting was very controversial among the experts and the author could not release the study details on the methodology to elucidate this matter.

I will publish the highlights of this meeting on the website of US Hair Restoration soon.