Hair Replacement!
|
|
Since hair naturally grows in follicles that contain groupings of 1 to 4 hairs, todays most advanced techniques transplant these naturally occurring 1 out of 4 hair "follicular units" in their natural groupings. Thus modern hair replacement can achieve a natural appearance by mimicing nature hair for hair. This recent hair transplant procedure is called "Follicular Unit Transplantation." Given the improved naturalness of hair replacement surgery hair loss sufferers are increasingly selecting this hair loss treatment.
Hair replacement options
Hair Replacement Systems
Wearing a hair system (also called a hairpiece, toupee or wig) might be socially awkward for some people. But for others, it's an affordable and safe solution to their hair loss. Of course a natural appearance is essential, so knowing a little about your options can go a long way.Hair Replacement Surgery
Going under the knife is a scary thought for many people. But surgery can also be an effective solution for men and women who experience a light amount of hair loss. Finding the right doctor and educating yourself on hair restoration are the first steps in getting the most out of surgical hair replacement.Drugs and Topical Treatments
Often referred to as "miracles in a bottle" this hair replacement option is dominated by a few big names including Rogaine® and Propecia®. But does it work? Many people have claimed to experience new growth in varying levels and these medicinal treatments are FDA approved after all. So how do you know if it's for you?Hair replacement women
Hair replacement for women is a process that is becoming more common, but is unfortunately still a topic avoided by many. It's a common misconception that men are the only ones who would have cause for a hair replacement system. However, there are plenty of attractive women who benefit every day from the use of systems offering hair replacement for women.From partial to full integration, hair replacement for women can remedy a wide range of hair loss issues. You can even custom order a hair system to match your hair color, density, wave or curl, and length. This ensures that any solution will blend naturally with your own hair, becoming virtually undetectable.
These solutions offering hair replacement for women look natural and feel comfortable while looking stylish. These are oftentimes sold for upwards of $1,500, because of their high quality. Through a discount retailer, women can sometimes locate these hair loss solutions for as low as $600.
Best of all, wearers do not have to sacrifice style for price. You can have your hair cut and styled to your liking, regardless of where you are located. Some solutions with more personal service can even refer you to a local stylist who is reputable and reasonably priced.
Hair replacement clinics
Remember when you had a full head of hair? And remember how you felt as you began losing it? At first it was hardly noticeable, but little by little you lost more and more hair... on your towel... your brush... the shower curtain...Don't worry, the Hair Replacement Clinic can help. provide natural and realistic ways for men, women and children experiencing hair loss to get back what they have lost. We can restore your look, your style, and most importantly - your confidence.
Most people who have experienced hair loss began noticing a receding or thinning hairline as they got older, but hair loss can also be the result of other circumstances, such as an illness or disease, hormonal imbalance, reaction to chemotherapy treatments, or the result of a traumatic accident.
No two situations are alike: some experience gradual hair loss, while others notice rapid fallout. There are many different patterns of baldness as well. We find that the stories of our clients are as unique as the individuals themselves.
At a hair replacement clinic, we realize there is no "one size fits all" solution to hair loss. We offer both surgical and non-surgical procedures for restoring your hair - real solutions that last!
Hair Replacement History
The use of both scalp flaps, in which a band of tissue with its original blood supply is shifted to the bald area, and free grafts dates back to the 19th century. Modern transplant techniques began in Japan in the 1930s, where surgeons used small grafts, and even "follicular unit grafts" to replace damaged areas of lashes or lashes. They did not attempt to treat baldness per se. Their efforts did not receive worldwide attention at the time, and the traumas of World War II kept their advances isolated for another two decades.The modern era of hair replacement in the western world was ushered in the late 1950s, when New York dermatologists began to experiment with free donor grafts to balding areas in patients with male pattern baldness. Previously it had been thought that transplanted hair would thrive no more than the original hair at the "recipient" site. Orentreich demonstrated that such grafts were "donor dominant", as the new hairs grew and lasted just as they would have at their original home.
For the next twenty years, surgeons worked on transplanting smaller grafts, but results were only minimally successful, with 2-4 mm "plugs" leading to a doll's head-like appearance. In the 1980s, Uebel in Brazil popularized using large numbers of small grafts, while in the United States Rassman began using thousands of micrografts in a single session.
In the late 1980s, Limmer introduced the use of the stereo-microscope to dissect a single donor strip into small micrografts. In 1995, Bernstein and Rassman published the first paper on "Follicular Unit Transplantation." where hair is transplanted exclusively in naturally occurring groups of 1-4 hairs. With microscopic dissection of donor pieces from an excised portion of scalp, individual follicular units containing but 1-4 hairs could be prepared and individually relocated into needle punctures in the recipient areas. Since the transplanted hair mimics the way hair grows in nature, completely natural results were attainable.
The follicular unit hair transplant procedure has continued to evolve, becoming more refined and minimally invasive as the size of the graft incisions have become smaller. These smaller and less invasive incisions enable surgeons to place a larger number of follicular unit grafts into a given area. With current techniques, over 50 grafts can be placed per square centimeter, when appropriate for the patient.
Surgeons have also devoted more attention to the angle and orientation of the transplanted grafts. The adoption of the lateral slit technique in the early 2000s, enabled hair transplant surgeons to orient 2 to 4 hair follicular unit grafts so that they splay out across the scalp's surface . This enabled the transplanted hair to lie better on the scalp and provide better coverage to the bald areas.
Mens hair replacement
The latest in state-of-the-art hair restoration and replacement solutions designed specifically to meet the individual and unique needs of each of our clients.By creating 100% customized non-surgical, hair replacement for men suffering from the devastating effects of hair loss, we offer our clients the completely natural look and feel of actual growing hair in whatever style and color they desire.
The SensiGraft hair replacement system is virtually undetectable to both sight and touch because your hair graft is made from the best human or synthetic hair available.
Your hair replacement will be created to your exact age-appropriate specifications, based upon your desires and expectations, and customized to your individually unique lifestyle.
Hair Replacement The procedure
At an initial consultation, the surgeon analyzes the patient's scalp, discusses his preferences and expectations, and advises him/her on the best approach (e.g.,single vs. multiple sessions) and what results might reasonably be expected.For several days prior to surgery the patient refrains from using any medicines, or alcohol, which might result in intraoperative bleeding and resultant poor "take" of the grafts. Pre-operative antibiotics are commonly prescribed to prevent wound or graft infections.
Hair replacement therapy
Hair loss affects one out of three men and one in five women. It can be caused by a multitude of factors, such as hereditary male-pattern baldness, hormonal changes in women, accidents, stress, burns and illness.Contrary to popular belief, there is almost nothing a person can do to prevent thinning hair, such as shampooing less frequently or avoiding wearing hats. This is unfortunate, as people may feel that hair loss and/or partial baldness make them look older than their years. Some discover hair loss beginning in their early 20s.
The good news is that hair replacement surgery can now restore hair growth and fill out thin or bald spots.
A strip of hair is removed from the back of the head and then divided into micro-grafts. Then, these micro-grafts are inserted in tiny slits or punches in the scalp. Other options involve removing areas of bald skin or stretching the scalp with tissue expanders.
New hair starts growing in six weeks to 12 weeks. The procedure is safe, relatively uncomplicated and performed under local anesthesia, on an outpatient basis. Typically, multiple sessions are required to achieve desired results, spaced at least four months apart, so that the scalp can heal.
Hair Replacement Cost
In recent years hair transplants have become less expensive.Hair transplant prices typically range from $3.00 to $7.00 per graft, with $4 to $5 per graft being about average. Normally the price per graft also drops as the size of the surgical session increases. A typical surgical session can range from 1,500 to over 4,000 grafts depending on the needs of the patient. (To estimate the number of grafts a patient may need use the animated graft calculator). A few clinics are now offering larger sessions of up to 6000 grafts in one sitting.
Hair Replacement Surgery
Transplant operations are performed on an outpatient basis, with mild sedation (optional) and injected topical anesthesia, and typically last about four hours. The scalp is shampooed and then treated with an antibacterial chemical prior to the donor scalp being harvested.In the usual follicular unit procedure, the surgeon harvests a strip of skin from the posterior scalp, in an area of good hair growth. The excised strip is about 1-1.5 x 15-30 cm in size. While he is closing the resulting wound, assistants begin to dissect individual follicular unit grafts from the strip. Working with binocular microscopes, they take great care to remove excess fibrous and fatty tissue without damaging the vital follicular cells that will produce the patients' first crop of new hair.
The surgeon then uses a fine needle to puncture the sites for receiving the grafts, placing them in a predetermined density and pattern, and angling the wounds in a consistent fashion to promote a realistic hair pattern. The assistants generally do the final part of the procedure, inserting the individual grafts in place.
The finest surgeons can place more than 70 grafts per square centimeter in order to get a good density and appearance. In a "megasession", they may perform more prolonged surgeries, placing more than 2500-3000 grafts, reportedly even 6000 grafts, in one sitting. There is a recently reported case of 7761 follicular units transplanted in a patient, performed by Dr. Victor Hasson in one 18 hour megasession.
After demonstrating the non-reversible injury to the head's nervous system all surgical procedures were banned in France. Several people have died in different operating rooms while undergoing surgery in Paris and in Marseille. For example, a well trained Parisian surgeon had two cases of deceased patients.
Hair Replacement Procedure in action
An example of this procedure from consultation through each stage of hair growth can be read, heard, and seen through a blog, Battle Against Bald, created by Seth Garon. (See link below)Hair Replacement New technology
Newer procedures today allow for far less invasive surgery with optimal results. FUE (Follicular Unit Extraction), invented by Dr. Ray Woods and Dr. Angela Woods Campbell of Australia, allows the surgeon to select individual follicular units from a donor region and transplant them to the recipient region. This method uses a small needle (0,50-0,75 mm diameter)to pluck out the follicular units, eliminating the need for the surgeon to excise skin from the back of the head. Benefits of FUE are quicker healing time, far less trauma, no strip scar, and the surgeon's ability to individually select follicular units. Drawbacks are that the procedure is far more time intensive than traditional STRIP methods and thus is much more costly. A top STRIP doctor can transplant more than 3000 grafts in a day, while a top FUE surgeon is limited to 1000-2500 in a day. An FUE procedure can continue over consecutive days, allowing to harvest over 3000 grafts if required for larger sessions. If too many grafts are harvested, a patient may get a "moth eaten" appearance in the back of his head. Transplants using FUE, however, still have the same drawbacks as the strip method when it comes to the recipient site often leaving patients with poor density, pitted skin and unappealing results when done incorrectly as seen in this FUE patient.An extension of the FUE procedure is BHT, body hair replacement (BHT). A select group of surgeons are now successfully transplanting body hair to the head. In some cases, the body hair can take on many characteristics of head hair. However, the procedure is still in its infancy, and while there have been successful cases, more completed results are needed to give a better assessment. At this stage the hair transplant community sees body hair as a good "filler" between scalp hairs, and as an additional donor source when patients have run out of scalp hair to transplant.
Lately some of the initial results of mega session BHT have started coming in. Basically it seems that yield is directly related to the quality of the extracted hair and the trauma it has received. Initial results seem to show that the time frame of removing a body hair and re implanting it to the scalp is critical. The less the graft is out of the body the better the results. Thus it seems that the new extraction protocols should be modified to minimize this critical time frame. While scalp grafts can survive out of the body for many hours the time frame for Body Hair is dramatically less. BH grafts that are thin and fragile (eg. arm and thighs) have dramatically less yield than robust hairs (eg. chest). Another thing to note about BH is that if DHT inhibiting drugs are used (eg. Finasteride or Dutraside) these drugs could work against the success of BHT. The same drugs that are very successful in stopping or reversing MPB have a negative effect on body hair.
Hair Replacement Post-operative care
Advances in wound care allow for semi-permeable dressings, which allow seepage of blood and tissue fluid, to be applied and changed at least daily. The vulnerable recipient area must be shielded from the sun, and is not shampooed for about a week.During the first ten days, virtually all of the transplanted hairs, inevitably traumatized by their relocation, will fall out ("shock loss"). After two to three months new hair will begin to erupt from the moved follicles. The patient's hair will grow normally, and continue to thicken through the next six to nine months. Any subsequent hair loss is likely to be only from untreated areas. Some patients elect to use medications to retard such loss, while others plan a subsequent transplant procedure to deal with this eventuality.
Hair Replacement Side Effects
There are possible side effects that may be encountered after a hair loss treatment. Hair thinning, known as "shock loss", is a common side effect that is usually temporary. Bald patches are also common, as fifty to a hundred hairs can be lost each day.Other side effects include swelling of several possible areas such as the scalp and forehead. If this becomes uncomfortable, medication may be sought from a doctor to ease the swelling. Additionally, the patient must be careful if his scalp starts itching, scratching it will only make it worse and cause scabs to form. A moisturizer or massage shampoo may be used in order to relieve the itching.
After demonstrating the non-reversible injury to the head's nervous system all surgical procedures were banned in France. Several people have died in different operating rooms while undergoing surgery in Paris and in Marseille. For example, a well trained Parisian surgeon had two cases of deceased patients.
