Surgical Hair Replacement

Surgical Hair Replacement  

Many people all over the United States consider surgical hair restoration as their solution to hair loss. Hair transplants are performed by harvesting DHT resistant hair from the back of the scalp.  Since everyone has a different genetic makeup in surgical hair restoration you are your own donor (hair can be transplanted from identical twins with the same genetic makeup). The hair from the back of your scalp is transferred to the balding area.

The hair follicles gathered forms the donating area are called grafts. These include one or more hair follicles with the associated hair, skin, and tissue. The grafts are later implanted into the balding area according to the recession.  Since not everyone has the same kind of hair and scalp, not everyone is a good candidate. According to the American Hair Loss Association “It is also important to note that surgery should always be your last resort after all attempts to stop the progression of your hair loss have been exhausted. Currently in the United States the field of surgical hair restoration is completely unregulated by both the government and the medical community. In the US any licensed physician can legally perform hair transplant surgery without any prior surgical training or accreditation of any kind. Every physician, MD or DO, has the legal right to pick up a scalpel and proclaim him/herself a qualified hair transplant surgeon”. Because of this finding a trustworthy surgical hair restoration clinic is very hard. Many but not all televised hair transplant companies are created solely for profit, and not customer satisfaction. Larger the company the less quality they acquire.

Many people who have high expectations going into the surgery come out disappointed.  Since you can only retrieve so much hair from the back of your head, you can only cover the same amount of your balding area. That donor hair has to be evenly distributed, and is not ideal for people with a large balding area. When considering surgical hair replacement you have to keep in mind that your recession may still continue.

The procedure itself is very time consuming and costly. One procedure takes anywhere from five to eight hours. Since the number of procedures depends on the extent of your hair loss, one session is usually, not enough to cover the whole area. Most people may have to have several procedures each taking up to ten hours.

You must also take under consideration some guidelines that come with surgical hair restoration. Your doctor will instruct you specifically on what you can eat, drink, and the medications you should avoid before the surgery. It is also very important for smokers to realize that they cannot smoke for at least two weeks before and at least one month after the surgery. Because smocking interferes with the blood flow to the skin it will slow down the healing process.

After the surgery is completed, the patient cannot drive home. You must have someone who is able to pick you up.  Many doctors claim that a patient will be able to get back to their day to day lives after one or two days, but realistically it is best to rest at least a week after the procedure.