by Hair transplant is a medical procedure that removes hair follicles in one area of your body, usually called the donor site, to a bald or thinning part of your body called the recipient site. The procedure is mainly used to cure male pattern baldness, also called Androgenetic Alopecia. In this case it will remove the hair growth in the donor areas, but not on the recipient sites. A hair transplant is typically used when hair growth is due to a heredity condition such as male or female pattern baldness, and the hair growth in these areas is permanent or near to permanent. It may be used for hair loss caused by chemotherapy treatments or severe burns.
Follicular unit transplantation (FUT) involves the use of strips to harvest follicular units from one area of the patient’s body and place them into the bald areas. When the follicular units are transplanted, the blood supply to the strip is closed, and the follicular unit is embedded into the target bald area. The strip is removed after one or two weeks, depending on the type of treatment. Strip harvesting is the least invasive hair transplant technique available and it offers excellent results. FUE also offers an effective treatment for patients who have experienced allergic reactions to traditional hair grafts.
There are two major advantages of FUE hair transplant procedures. The first advantage is that there is little or no scarring following surgery. Because the transplanted hairs are not positioned directly onto the skin, there is not the common phenomenon of puffed-up hairs above the recipient area. Scarring from a FUE treatment can sometimes be mild to moderate and healing time is very rapid. The second major advantage of FUE is that the scars from the surgery are so minimal that they can be used to enhance natural beauty and cancellations.
A number of factors are considered when determining which hair transplant procedure is most appropriate for you. Age, for instance, will play a large role in determining which procedure will be most effective. An older patient may have less elasticity in the skin, which means that scarring will be more pronounced. Your surgeon will determine the best course of hair transplant surgery based on these and other factors.
Age also plays a part in how many follicular units a patient can expect to receive during a single hair transplant procedure. For instance, an individual who is 45 years old or younger may have a difficult time conceiving due to their advanced age. A hair loss clinic will often take this into account when evaluating potential patients. This is because thinning hair occurs naturally with age and the hair transplant procedure must be performed early in life if the patient expects to have successful hair growth. Older patients also have a greater chance of experiencing hair loss since the average follicular unit production slows as people age.
Your surgeon will also consider your skin type when determining which hair transplant procedure is most appropriate. Different hair transplant procedures are more successful for different types of skin. Thinning hair occurs more commonly with African-American skin, as it is a genetic trait. In contrast, white skin will rarely experience hair transplant failure due to genetic factors. However, thinning hair does occur frequently in patients with white skin. Because of this, a physician may choose to perform a hair transplant on a patient who has very little volume on their scalp in order to avoid more noticeable facial hair loss.
Many individuals choose to undergo hair transplant surgery when their hair loss has become severe, or they have experienced a number of receding hair lines. If you have experienced significant thinning over the past nine months, a consultation with a dermatologist may be the best choice. Your dermatologist will perform a series of tests to determine if you are a candidate for a transplant, and will likely give you some information and instructions on how to prepare for the procedure.
Hair transplants typically take around two weeks to complete. Once the procedure has been completed, hair growth will normally resume within one to two weeks. You will most likely have to apply foundation again within a couple of weeks to lock in the new hair transplant. Since hair transplantation can be expensive, your doctor will most likely recommend that you wear loose clothing during the first month and then apply a protein based wrap to keep your skin moisturized. This wrap will help you maintain good healthy appearance throughout the two weeks of your post-operative stay in the hospital and will help you resume your normal daily activities a week after the procedure.
