The Ultimate Hair Restoration Plan
So you are one of the many unfortunate people who suffer from hair loss. Some people suffer from it worse than others. If you are one of those people, this is a layout of how to get the top of your head to look like it did when you had hair.
The first step (and the most important) is to slow down the hair loss. Many people are under the impression that a hair transplant will also somehow stop hair loss, but that is not possible. A hair transplant will only move hairs from one area to another to replace hairs that are gone. This is why it is much more important to stop hair loss then it is to replace it. Some great treatments that are proven to slow down and even stop hair loss are as follows:
Minoxidil (Rogaine)
This is a topical treatment that comes in many types of treatments such as spray, mousse, and even shampoo. Simply apply this twice a day (once in the morning and once at night before bed), and Rogaine will slow down and reverse the effects of miniaturization on the hair strands. This keeps the hairs from falling out.
Finasteride (Propecia)
This pill is taken orally once a day and works to block the hormone responsible for hair loss, DHT (dihydrotestosterone). Propecia is approved by Health Canada and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and is still the most effective DHT blocker on the market.
PRP (Platelet-Rich Plasma) Therapy
This is an injection of your own blood back into your scalp after it has been spun in a centrifuge to remove the unnecessary red blood cells, leaving only the growth hormones and proteins in the platelet-rich plasma of the blood. This treatment should be done at least 3 times within the first 3 to 4 months with an annual treatment afterwards. This treatment stimulates robust hair growth in existing hair as well as in hair that is about to fall out. As an additional benefit, it has also been shown to restore melanin to the hair, thereby restoring hair to its natural colour.
As previously discussed, the only way to replace hair in an area where it has fallen out due to androgenetic alopecia is through a hair transplant. The common debate amongst hair restoration specialists is what type of procedure is better, FUE or FUT. I personally prefer the FUE method because it does not leave any significant visible scarring and the downtime is much less in comparison to the FUT method. If done correctly by an experienced specialist, the results of FUE are still great, and the success rate is upwards of 95%. A hair transplant is limited, however, by the amount of viable donor hairs that can be harvested without leaving the donor area looking thin or “overharvested”. So if a patient has extensive hair loss, it is impossible to do a good hair transplant and get back a full head of thick hair.
This leads to the final piece of the equation, SMP (scalp micro-pigmentation). SMP is a specialized, medical grade semi permanent head tattoo that gives the impression of having a full head of hair. When SMP is done in conjunction with a hair transplant, the most important area to focus on for the hair transplant will be to restore a frontal hairline with lots of density. This will typically take from 2,000 to 3,000 grafts. The normal range of donor hair that can be used safely is 5,000 to 6,000, so a patient can do a second treatment around the crown area afterwards to add some more hair to thinning areas. Once the transplant is complete, the use of scalp micro-pigmentation throughout the scalp is a great way to create the illusion of a complete head of hair.
