How Is Hereditary Hair Loss Diagnosed
Your doctor will ask you questions about your hair loss, including the pattern of your hair loss and whether you have any other medical conditions. Your doctor will also examine your hair. No tests are needed to diagnose hereditary hair loss, but blood tests may be done to rule out other conditions that can cause hair loss.
Effective Treatment #: Minoxidil
What is it? Minoxidil is a topical, over-the-counter treatment that is most effective for hair regrowth along the top of your head and crown.
Does it work? Minoxidil must be consistently applied, twice a day every day! in order to work. It can take 4-6 months of regular application before you see results. If you stop using it, however, any new hair will fall out and hair loss will start again.
What do the experts say? A 120-week, placebo-controlled trial of minoxidil solution, published by the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology, found a statistically significant increase in hair count and improved hair loss condition in the minoxidil group. Short story: Minoxidil is clinically proven to help regrow hair by up to 35%.
What are the side effects? Although this drug is generally safe, like any medication, it can be associated with rare but serious side effects. You can read more about minoxidils side effects here. Contact your doctor if you experience signs of serious allergic reaction, dizziness, or difficulty breathing while taking these medications.
What Questions Might Your Healthcare Provider Ask To Diagnose And Categorize Your Hair Loss
Your healthcare provider might ask about your habits:
- What kinds of hair products do you use?
- What kinds of hair styles do you wear?
- What types of food do you eat ?
- Do you have a habit of pulling your hair out ?
They might ask about your history:
- Has anyone in your immediate family experienced hair loss?
- Is there anything stressful going on in your life?
- What medications and supplements do you take every day?
- Has hair loss ever happened to you before?
- What foods are in your diet?
And, they might ask about your observations:
- How long have you been losing hair?
- Have you been shedding more?
- Have you noticed hair loss in places other than your scalp, like your eyebrows? Leg and arm hair?
- Does anything worsen your hair loss?
- Does anything improve your hair loss?
- Have you noticed hair loss occasionally or has it been going on continuously?
- Have you noticed if your hair growth has changed?
- Has your hair been breaking more often?
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Homeopathic Remedies For Hair Loss
1. Fluoric acid : This medicine treats well when a person is suffering from vertex baldness, weak hair, and Idiopathic hair loss.
2. Phosphoric acid : Phosphoric acid cures the progressive thinning of hair, which has caused because of lot of stress and grief. It also stops early greying of hair.
3. Phosphorus : When you see that handful of hair comes into your hands while combing, or you are facing hair loss due to some hemorrhagic disorder, Phosphorus can help you out better. It will also cure the problem of dry and itchy scalp.
4. Graphites : This homeopathic remedy treats the troubles of hair fall, caused by menopause and constipation. Graphites cure patchy baldness and hair fall on sides.
5. Mezereum : Mezereum is also a great choice when you are losing handful of strands, and you are afflicted with itchy and dry scalp, and dandruff.
6. : Sepia treats the hair loss, which is caused by menopause or after giving birth to a child.
7. Silica : Frontal hair loss, early greying and baldness at a young age are the main symptoms that are purged with Silica.
The various other medicines to treat hair loss are Natrum mur, Psorinum, Selenium, Medorrhinum, Lachesis, Merc sol, Lycopodium, Kali carb, and Borax.
Buying Guide For Best Hair Loss Treatments For Women
Hair loss is usually thought as a problem that affects only men, but many women experience hair thinning and loss as they age, too. There are many reasons why someone might start to lose hair, but regardless of the cause, it can wreak havoc on a womans self-esteem and confidence.
Fortunately, there are plenty of OTC hair loss treatments that can help slow the loss or even regrow hair. But not all hair loss treatments for women are the same. If you dont choose an effective product, youll just be wasting your time and money.
Fortunately, our handy shopping guide has plenty of tips to help you pick the best hair loss treatment for your needs. If youre ready to buy, check out our top recommendations.
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Effectiveness Of Laser Hair Regrowth Devices
Though they are somewhat controversial in the medical community, LLLT devices have been proven successful for a surprisingly large portion of people in clinical studies.
One 2017 study showed that nearly all male subjects experienced moderate hair regrowth .
In another clinical study, hair count among participants improved by 19 hairs per square centimeter after six months of using LLLT .
A different study of HairMax laser combs demonstrated that a 12-beam laser comb resulted in an average of 26 more hairs per square centimeter in the treated area, after six months of use. And in one study, the specific laser wavelength used by HairMax proved effective in achieving robust hair growth in 40% of men.
One tricky aspect of LLLT is that the application for human hair growth hasnt been studied long-term yet and so the most effective wavelength is unclear. But its clear that effectiveness depends on the quality and amount of lasers that operate within a constructive wavelength range. And its important that the device actually uses lasers there is no evidence that LEDs, even those that emit the same wavelengths, do anything to stop hair loss or promote hair regrowth.
Minoxidil Is A Prescription Treatment That Is Approved By The Fda For Use In Treating Baldness
Minoxidil works by promoting hair growth by opening up dormant hair follicles. If your hair loss is related to an underlying medical condition, treatment for that condition will also be necessary. If a particular drug is causing your hair loss, then your physician might recommend that you stop using it within a six month period.
Another FDA approved prescription treatment for hair loss is finasteride, which is marketed under the trade names Propecia, AIMS and Rogaine. Like minoxidil, finasteride is also approved for treating androgenetic alopecia, which is the most common type of hair loss. However, finasteride has been shown to have limited effectiveness for people with thinning hair due to male pattern alopecia, also known as figure 3.
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Pumpkin Seed Oil Supplements
Pumpkin seed oil is sold in oil gel capsules, too.
An important thing to note is that supplements arent regulated by the FDA in the same way other foods and drugs are.
That means the quality and dosage of supplements you get may vary from manufacturer to manufacturer.
For your safety, make sure to always purchase your supplements from a reputable source.
What Are The Common Causes Of Hair Loss In Women
What causes hair loss?
- Hair style: Your style of hair can cause hair loss when your hair is arranged in ways that pull on your roots, like tight ponytails, braids, or corn rows. This type of hair loss is called traction alopecia. If hair follicles are damaged, the loss can be permanent.
- Vitamin deficiency.
- Over processed scalp hair .
What causes anagen effluvium hair loss?
- Toxic substances, including chemotherapy, radiation therapy and some medications. These cause sudden hair loss that can occur anywhere on your body. It happens to hair in the growth stage. Sometimes, this type of hair loss can be permanent if your hair follicles are damaged.
What causes telogen effluvium hair loss?
- Extreme physical stress or shock to your body: This causes temporary hair loss. This category includes events like losing a lot of weight, surgery, anemia, illness and having a baby.
- Extreme emotional stress: mental illness, the death of a loved one, etc.
- An abnormal thyroid.
- Medications and supplements: blood pressure medicines, gout medicines and high doses of Vitamin A.
- Hormone changes caused by pregnancy, menopause or birth control pills.
What causes FPHL ?
- Genes: Your familys genes can cause thinning of hair along the top of your head.
- Aging: Hormone changes as you age can cause balding.
- Menopause: This type of hair loss often gets worse when estrogen is lost during menopause.
There are also some conditions that affect hair loss:
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Products In The Pipeline
HairLossTalk.com has put together an illuminating infographic on the progress of new treatments for hair loss that are coming down the R& D pipeline.
However, dont wait for these new treatments to come out to start treating AGA. If there is one thing we know about hair loss, it is that it is easier to prevent than it is to reverse, and these treatments are all a ways off of being released for the public.
The majority of them are in stage 2 of research or earlier.
You can check out the infographic for yourself, but we will discuss the three that are farthest along the research and development track: RHC-01, Hair Stimulating Complex, and Follica.
How To Treat Hair Loss: Dht Blockers
In guys who are genetically susceptible to AGA, high DHT levels mean more hair loss. Thatâs where DHT blockers come in.
DHT blockers are medications thatâyou guessed itâblock DHT.
They do that by binding to 5α-reductase, the enzyme thatâs part of the reaction that turns testosterone into DHT. By inhibiting this enzyme, less testosterone is converted into DHT, and there is an overall reduction in DHT levels.
As a result of this lower concentration of DHT, less of it binds to hair follicles, so fewer follicles start to shrink and die. The follicles stay healthy and continue to produce hair.
Think of DHT blockers like a barrier between testosterone and the 5α-reductase enzyme. By keeping these two apart, they canât create DHT, and so your hair continues to grow without interruption.
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The Next Generation Of Transplants
With no drug to prevent your hair from falling out, cosmetic surgery has looked to fill the void. Over the past two decades hair transplants which take hair follicles from DHT-resistant donor areas at the back and sides of the scalp and relocate them to cover up bald patches have offered new hope for hair loss sufferers.
Such is the demand that market analysts have predicted the value of the global hair transplant industry will exceed $24.8bn by 2024, and the techniques are becoming increasingly advanced. Gho has pioneered a method called partial longitudinal follicular unit extraction, which extracts only a small portion of each hair follicle. This means that the patient isnt left with scarring on the back and sides of their head, a serious risk with some traditional transplant procedures, which remove strips of skin and graft them into the bald area.
We discovered that you dont need the whole follicle, only a very small part, to produce a new hair to be transplanted into the recipient area, he explains. This means that after the treatment, the hairs in the donor area can be cut short, without any, or with minimal, visible density loss.
Despite such advances, one of the current limitations of hair transplants is that many patients tend to require more than one procedure if they continue to lose their hair. Patients who are completely bald may also lack sufficient follicles on the back and sides to cover the bald areas on top.
Effective Natural Hair Loss Treatment
Due to the natural growth cycle of hair follicles, results will start to show after 60-90 days. As part of the skin, it takes 4 weeks for hair to stop growing and fully separate itself from the scalp, and another 8-12 weeks for it to start growing again. What this means is that a patient that is loosing hair today, has been unknowingly loosing hair for the previous 2-4 weeks.
This is why patients must commit to a treatment plan for at least 3 months before changes begin to appear. More results will show, as time goes by.
When all parts of the Advanced Trichology® program have been implemented , both men and women can typically regrow 3 to 5 years of lost hair within an 18 months period.
Hair loss of 5 years or more, is usually not recoverable due to the hair follicle being dead or permanently miniaturized.
Our treatment plan has proven successful for the treatment of Male and Female Pattern Hair Loss, Telogen Effluvium, mild Alopecia Areata and drug induced hair loss.
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Generating New Hair From Scratch
Instead of relying on donor hair, the way forward could be to use patient stem cells to grow whole hair follicles completely from scratch in the lab. These follicles could then be grown in unlimited quantities, and grafted on to the scalp. Many of these initiatives are taking place in Japan and South Korea, where such research is being bankrolled by either the government or private companies.
Theres more investment in hair research in Korea and Japan, I think due to cultural differences, explains Ohsang Kwon, a dermatologist at Seoul National University hospital. In the western world, a lot of men will shave their head when they lose their hair. It is awkward to do this in our culture because it looks like a sign of a criminal or gangster.
In the past year, a number of Japanese research groups have published reports that hint tantalisingly at a major breakthrough. At Yokohama National University, scientists led by Junji Fukuda have developed an experimental method for generating new hair follicles from stem cells in far higher quantities than ever before, while later this year, scientists at the Riken Centre for Developmental Biology will launch one of the first ever clinical trials with hair follicles grown entirely from stem cells.
Soon There Will Be Unlimited Hair
New uses of stem cells and 3-D printing could make baldness obsolete .
In the tunnels under New York, commuters squeeze into lumbering trains and try not to make eye contact with the people whose sweaty bodies are pressed against theirs. As they surrender to the will of the transit authority, their eyes wander upward to find an unlikely promise of control: Many cars are plastered with ads that say Balding is now optional. These ads feature men in various states of elation. The men all have hairand not simply the errant tufts that have appeared for years in infomercials for hair restoration. No, this hair comes in the form of thick, leonine coiffures.
The ads are for a company called Hims, an online seller of the drugs finasteride and minoxidil . The marketing copy implies there has been some sort of breakthrough in the science of hair loss. But Propecia and Rogaine have been available for decades. They have proved modestly effective at slowing hair loss, but they cannot entirely prevent or reverse it. Even for people who can afford $44 a month for the companys hair-loss-drug package, balding is still not optional.
For a long time, weve been saying this is 10 years away, says Robert Bernstein, a dermatologist in Manhattan who specializes in hair transplantation. But now it actually might be less.
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