Ongoing Medication after Hair
Transplantation Surgery – Is it necessary?
Hair transplantation surgery as everyone
knows delivers fantastic results as long as the patient is deemed a suitable candidate and that the transplant is
performed by a very experienced and qualified hair
transplant surgeon and an experienced
team of technicians.
One thing that some patients never think
about when deciding to have a transplant is the potential of losing more of their
existing hair over the long term. These people come in with the mentality of,
“I just want to have one really decent hair transplant and to never have to
worry about hair loss again!” Let me first say that in some cases this is possible.
If a patient in their 60s that has been losing hair slowly for 40 years comes
in with only a small to medium sized balding area in their frontal hairline or
crown, they could transplant this area at a reasonable density per cm. The
Surgeon can also work an extra half inch into their existing surrounding hairs
to allow for the small amount of thinning that is expected to occur over the
next 20 years. In this scenario, based on the patients older age, their history
of very slow hair loss and the fact that the existing regions are still very thick,
such a patient could get away with just the one hair transplant procedure
during their entire life. The act of preserving existing hair with ongoing
medication would also not be necessary in this scenario. However this does not
represent the “typical” patient…
The typical patient is usually in their 30s
or 40s and has lost quite a noticeable amount of hair during the previous 5
years. They generally have the common sense to understand that the chances of
having less hair on top in 5-10 years from now if they do nothing to treat their
hair loss, is close to a 100% certainty. Therefore medications such as
finasteride ordutasteride are discussed by the Doctor during the consultation
process and expressed as an important step in maintaining long term happiness
after a hair transplant.
The two questions that the surgeon will ask
himself when assessing a potential hair transplant patient are:
1. Will this patient be happy with their
decision to have proceeded with a hair transplant when they come in for their
12 month check-up?
2. Based on their hair loss history and the
treatment plan that I can recommend, will they still be satisfied with their
head of hair in 5 or 10 years from now?
Let’s examine in detail what these two
questions mean:
1. The level of satisfaction and happiness
the patient shows at their 12 month check-up directly relates to the variables that affect outcome. This means that
if they have had a large number of grafts (such as 3500 grafts instead of 2000
grafts) placed into a moderate sized area; they have thick hair diameter that
is wavy; Existing hairs still remain within the thinning region to complement
the transplanted hairs and treating the thin area now gives them a complete
head of hair, their satisfaction level will be at a 10/10.
However if the patient had 2000 grafts
placed into the same area; Their hair diameter was naturally fine, and it was
already known that they really would have needed 4000 grafts to come out
looking complete, they are more
likely to have an overall satisfaction level of around 6/10. The patient would
certainly look better than before but when comparing themselves to the before
and afters of patients that have naturally thicker hair and bigger surgeries in
the vicinity of 4000-5000 grafts, they would feel a little let down. So point 1
basically indicates how many hair transplant variables work in their favour.
Point 2: Whether or not the hair transplant patient will still be satisfied in 5 or 10 years from now comes down to their
ongoing rate of hair loss. If for example the patient is 24 years old and
already within the moderate to advanced stages of hair loss, they may be deemed
suitable for surgery by the Doctor. The surgeon may determine that the patient
requires 4500 grafts and that he can comfortably obtain this graft number in
one session. Therefore based on this the Doctor can feel very confident that
the patient will be happy with their result after 12 months have elapsed. However due to the fact a large amount of
hair was already lost by the age of 24, it indicates that significantly more is
due to follow in the future. At this rate of shedding how much will theylose by
the time they are 30, 35 or 40 years of age? How long will it be before the
remaining regions thin out and they require a second transplant?
In this scenario ongoing Hair loss treatment
in the form of finasteride or dutasteride is essential to maintain long term
happiness. As these medications have been proven to minimize shedding in more
than 90% of users, they are a great way to delay (or possibly to prevent) the
need for a second hair transplant in the future.
So in conclusion, is ongoing medication
recommended after hair transplant surgery? The answer is YES in most cases.
This is because the amount of hair a hair loss sufferer can experience during
their lifetime is way more than the amount of permanent hair they have
available within their donor region to replace through repeated hair
transplants.
If you are to ever have a hair transplant
you need to also ask yourself whether you want to feel happy for a short time
or a long time after the procedure. If you want to remain happy for many years
after investing a large amount of capital into your hair transplant, then the
recommendation would be to use ongoing medication to remain looking and feeling
great as much as possible.
