There are a variety of shampoos and conditioners that can be used to slow down the progression of male and female pattern baldness. It should be noted that no shampoo nor conditioner is proven to regrow hair. Thus, for best results, any shampoo and conditioner product should be used in conjunction with other proven hair loss treatments such as Propecia (finasteride)and Rogaine (minoxidil).
Shampoo and conditioner can also help to "volumize" the hair, making hair appear thicker and fuller. Ingredients found in many of these treatments are designed to promote healthy hair growth and nourish the follicles. Thus, for a healthy scalp and hair, using one or more of these dedicated shampoos and conditioners can be the perfect addition to any hair loss treatment regimen. To learn more about each product, click a link below:
Nioxin is an excellent product including both a shampoo and conditioner formulated specifically for men and women with thinning hair."> While neither the shampoo nor conditioner hasn't been proven to have any effects on DHT (the hormone responsible for male pattern baldness); Nioxin's ability to strengthen follicles and energize cellular activity can improve the overall health of your scalp and hair. Nioxin therefore may have the ability to delay the effects of hair loss. For best results, use both the shampoo (refered to as Nioxxin Shampoo Scalp Cleanser) and conditioner (referred to as Nioxin Scalp Therapy) in conjunction with one another.
Nioxin Scalp Cleanser's cooling properties refreshes and cools the scalp promoting maximum cleanliness and freshness. Because of this, Nioxin shampoo, especially when combined with the conditioner also significantly reduces scalp itchiness and tenderness after hair transplant surgeryin both the recipient and donor areas.
Nioxin Scalp Therapy is an excellent volumizing scalp and hair conditioner that moisturizes and improves your hairs' natural resilience, while promoting a healthy scalp environment for optimal hair growth. Nioxin Conditioner is the perfect conclusion to the Nioxin Shampoo Scalp Cleanser.
Nioxin Scalp Therapy's minty fresh cooling sensation literally refreshes and cools the scalp promoting maximum cleanliness and freshness. Because of this, Nioxin also significantly reduces scalp itchiness and tenderness after hair transplant surgery in both the recipient and donor areas.
We strongly recommend using Nizoral shampooevery 2 or 3 days in conjunction with Nioxin. Its active ingredient ketoconazoleat 2% concentration has proven to be a moderate DHT inhibitor and has growth properties approximately as effective as Rogaine2%.
Developing Realistic Expectations:
Men and women sometimes suffer from hair loss for different reasons. Thus, diagnosing its cause is necessary to facilitate and promote proper treatment.
The Nioxin product line is an excellent scalp and hair cleansing shampoo and conditioning therapy but is not proven to stop hair loss. Thus, we strongly recommend using Nioxin in conjunction with the "Big 3" (Propecia, Rogaine, and Nizoral.
Nizoral 2% is magnificent shampoo and a significant part of what's referred to commonly as the Big 3. The other two are the FDA approved and proven treatments Propecia (finasteride)and Rogaine (minoxidil). To date, Nizoral is the only shampoo on the market that can make the unique claim that it's proven to stop the formation of DHT. Its active ingredient ketoconazoleat 2% concentration has proven to be a moderate DHT inhibitor and has growth stimulating properties about as effective as Rogaine 2%.
This product includes 2%, the highest concentration of the active ingredient ketoconazole. To view the clinical abstract proving the effectiveness of ketoconazole in the treatment of androgenetic alopecia, view "Ketoconazole as a hair loss treatment". There is also a less concentrated 1% of Nizoral. To learn more, visit Nizoral regular shampoo.
We strongly suggest using Nizoral shampoo in addition to other proven treatments. Nizoral should be used 2 or 3 times a week to avoid dry hair and a flakey scalp.
On the off days, you may want to consider rotating Nizoral with other excellent shampoos designed specifically for thinning hair. See the recommended treatments section below for other shampoos we recommend.
Developing Realistic Expectations:
Men and women sometimes suffer from hair loss for different reasons. Thus, diagnosing its cause is necessary to facilitate and promote proper treatment.
Don't expect immediate results. It's recommended to use Nizoral in conjunction with other proven treatments for at least 6 to 12 months before determining its effectiveness. Documenting your progress with bi-monthly photos can help you determine whether or not Nizoral has been successful in helping you maintain existing hair.
To date, only surgical hair restoration is proven to grow hair in completely bald areas. You are invited to have a free virtual consultation with one of our prescreened hair restoration physicians.
Tricomin is an all natural hair loss treatment designed for both men and women with thinning hair to stimulate hair regrowth and improve the appearance of thinning hair. It can also be used in conjunction with with Rogainehair regrowth treatment.
Tricomin Solution Follicle Therapy Spray combines the benefits of the Triamino Copper Nutritional Complex with an exceptional leave-in conditioner. The therapy spray enriches your hair and scalp with a unique blend of mineral and body-building ingredients and essential amino acids. Spraying the therapy spray liberally after shampooing daily will condition and treat your hair and scalp. It's recommended to apply this product to damp or dry hair.
The Tricomin Revitalizing Shampoo stimulates and restores health, structure, and vitality to thinning, fine, and damaged hair. It's recommended to use the Revitalizing Shampoo daily, gently massaging it into moistened hair scalp, leaving on for 3 to 5 minutes before rinsing. A second application may be made if desired.
The Restructuring Conditioner uses a unique moisture and nutrient-rich framework to help restore your hair's natural mineral and protein balance. This conditioner helps to add structure and body onto thinning and/or damaged hair.
For best results, use all three Tricomin products in conjunction with one another. All 3 Tricomin products is called the Tricomin TricoPak.
How It Works:
Al three Tricomin products contain the active ingredient copper peptides. Scientific evidence suggests that copper peptides can shorten the shedding (telogen) phase and elongate the growth (anagen) phase of the follicles. Partial FDA trials showed Tricomin products' effectiveness in promoting new hair growth.
Developing Realistic Expectations:
Tricomin copper peptide technology may provide marginal benefit to men and women with thinning hair. To date, only surgical hair restoration is proven to grow hair in completely bald areas. You are invited to have a free virtual consultation with one of our prescreened hair restoration physicians.
Follicular unit extraction is a minimally invasive procedure for performing follicular unit hair transplantation. However, unlike the predominant follicular unit transplant procedure, in which a strip of donor tissue is removed and dissected under magnification, the FUE procedure uses a small punch to extract each follicular unit one by one.
Both the strip excision and FUE procedures create 1, 2, 3, and 4 hair follicular unit grafts that are then transplanted into the balding area in the same manner. The primary difference between these two procedures is the technique used to harvest the follicular unit grafts.
Comparing the Strip Excision procedure to the Extraction (FUE) procedure
The common strip excision method of performing follicular unit hair transplantation involves surgically excising a thin horizontal strip of bald resistant skin from the donor area.
Strip Excision Procedure
Donor strip being excised
Incision sutured together
Hair combed down after suturing
This donor area is then sutured together. These sutures (either stitches or staples) are then typically removed about ten days after surgery. Some physicians use dissolvable sutures so that no removal is needed.
Patient’s donor area 2 months after surgery
Once this linear incision is fully healed the patient is left with a thin horizontal scar in the back of the head. This scar is typically hard to detect since the surrounding hair conceals it, even when the hair is cut short.
With the Follicular Unit Extraction or FUE procedure 1, 2, 3, and 4 hair follicular unit grafts are carefully extracted one at a time using a tiny punch of one millimeter or less. Often the surgeon requires the patient to buzz cut a portion of their donor area so that they are able to see the patient’s scalp.
The follicular units are extracted
The follicular units are extracted by placing the punch around a single follicular unit and cutting a small circle through the skin around that follicular unit. The follicular unit is then gently pulled up and away from the loose tissue underneath the skin.
The small hole left behind after the follicle is extracted then heals over the following week. Normally this small round incision contracts as it heals making the resulting round scar smaller than the size of the 1mm punch that made the incision. The FUE patient ultimately ends up with hundreds of small round white scars, which are normally not detectable once the patient’s hair grows out.View a video of an actual FUE surgery.
To Extract or to Excise, that is the question.
Advocates for the relatively new FUE procedure claim that this procedure produces less noticeable scarring and no tightness or numbness in the donor area since no donor tissue has been pulled together and sutured. Many patients and physicians find the claim that FUE produces less visible scarring to be debatable.
Some physicians and patients also have concerns about the relatively new FUE procedure, such as the lack of formal studies regarding the percentage of follicles that may or may not be transected during the sight unseen extraction process.
In addition, since the physician must personally extract all follicles, one by one, the FUE procedure is very physician dependent and thus very expensive. The FUE procedure also requires considerably more time in surgery to move a given amount of hair to the balding area.
The standard strip excision procedure has the advantage of utilizing a collaborative team to carefully create the grafts once the donor tissue is removed in a strip. This collaborative approach enables a well trained staff to do sessions of 2,000 to 3,000 all follicular unit grafts in a single day. This team approach enables a patient to get a much larger number of grafts/hairs in one sitting at a much lower cost per hair than with the FUE procedure.
However, some believe that despite being relatively costly the FUE procedure may be appropriate for patients who have very limited elasticity in their donor area or who only need a small number of grafts.
As you see yourself balding, while others retain their hair, you may ask - why me?
The basic answer is – your hair loss is due to your genetic make up. Your thinning hair is not due to anything you have done, whether wearing too many hats, washing your hair too much or too little or any other hair loss myths. Alopecia or hair loss is primarily genetic and is referred to as "Androgenetic Alopecia" in the medical community.
Your hair's future is largely determined before you're even born. Your follicles have been genetically programmed as to when, where and how much baldness (if any), you'll experience in your lifetime. But the fate of your hair can be altered or compensated for with modern hair loss treatments.
So what are the specific causes of hair loss?
Baldness is largely the result of certain hormones interacting over time with those hair follicles that are vulnerable to their effects.
Both men and women produce "male" hormones. The three most common are testosterone, androsteinedione, and dihydrotestosterone (DHT). Hair follicles, as well as the sebaceous glands, contain high levels of an enzyme called 5-alpha-reductase. This enzyme converts testosterone into DHT, via the blood. DHT is the source of most male pattern balding.
In some people, their follicles on the top of the head are genetically vulnerable to baldness. Over time, these genetically vulnerable follicles are acted upon by the hormone DHT. This hormone binds with the receptor sites of these vulnerable follicles and cause the hair follicle to weaken over time. Propecia is a drug that has been shown to slow the creation of DHT and can be helpful in slowing, stopping or in some cases, reversing hair loss when it is used early enough.
Hair grows naturally in cycles of approximately 3 to 8 years. At the end of the growth cycle, the hair shaft is shed from the follicle and a new hair grows. With thinning hair or balding, each successive growth cycle is shorter and the hair produced is thinner and finer. This is called 'miniturization'.
Men and women don't go bald overnight, it is a slow progression of thinning hair and hair loss that eventually produces baldness. In many cases, the balding has progressed to such a stage that hair loss treatment products aren't enough to reverse the balding process.
Few treatments have the dramatic effect of restoring hair like hair restoration surgery. Click here to learn more about hair restoration.
Not all hair loss is permanent. There are many causes of temporary hair loss that can be treated with diet, stress reduction and a visit to your doctor. Click here to learn about other causes of hair loss.
Androgenetic Alopecia
And rogenetic Alopecia, commonly referred to as 'genetic balding', is the main cause of male and female hair loss. This genetic 'programming' accounts for 95% of male hair loss.
For baldness to occur three factors need to be present:
1.The presence of and rogens, or male hormones.
2. A genetic pre-disposition to balding.
3. Time for the DHT to degrade the vulnerable hair follicles.
While they comprise less than ten percent of permanent hair loss, there are several other Causes of Hair Loss like stress, nutrition, health, age and hormones, that can cause temporary as well as permanent hair loss.
There are also several categories of treatments for hair loss which include drugs, topical lotions, hair care products, hair replacement systems and hair restoration surgery. To learn more about each, please visit our Hair Loss Treatment section.
Dr. Ratchathorn in Thailand performs high-density FUE, and she is involved in every step of the procedure. She provides patients with top-notch quality at an affordable rate.
The exciting new Rogaine foam has undergone its own extensive FDA trials and can rightfully boast an impressive 85% hair regrowth success rate in people who use it twice daily. This is more than 20% higher than the liquid 5% minoxidil solution at 64%. Rogaine foam also comes without the inconveniences of its liquid counterpart such as scalp irritation, flaking, and messy application. The foam dries almost instantly as opposed to the liquid's 15 minute waiting period.
Note: Despite what the insert says, Rogaine works just as well for frontal hair loss, recession, and thinning hair.
How It Works:
Rogaine foam uses versafoam technology to aid the delivery of the minoxidil to the hair follicles. As the minoxidil absorbs into the scalp, it stimulates follicles, revitalizing them, promoting thicker and healthier hair growth. This promotes a thicker and fuller appearance of hair.
Developing Realistic Expectations:
While Rogaine foam is supreme in many ways, it's unlikely to regrow thick terminal hair in completely bald areas. For best results, men ought to consider combining Rogaine with Propecia (finasteride), the only FDA approved and clinically proven DHT inhibitor to stop hair loss. See the "recommended treatments" section below for more details.
Don't expect immediate results. Just as hair loss is a slow process, regrowing it is too. Thus, it's recommended to use Rogaine for approximately 6 to 12 months before determining its effectiveness. Documenting your progress with bi-monthly photos can help you better evaluate the results.
Hair shedding is a common symptom the first few months and a sign that the medication may be working for you. It's crucial to push past this stage with continued use for the recommended period of time.
There are several topical treatments like Revivogen, Crinagen, Progesterone Creams, Kevis 8 and Xandrox that claim to minimize or block the amount of dyhydrotestosterone (DHT) present in the scalp.
DHT acts as a catalyst for the hair loss process as it binds with the receptor sites in hair follicles that are genetically vulnerable to hair loss. Over time, this process of DHT acting on the genetically vulnerable hair follicles hurts their ability to grow healthy hair.
The success of these topical treatments in reducing DHT levels in the scalp has not been clinically proven. However, the possibility of reducing DHT only in the scalp region rather than through out the entire body as with Propecia or Avodart is appealing.
Alopecia areata (sometimes referred to as“spot baldness”) is a medical condition that typically results in patchy hairloss or bald spots on the scalp, beard, arms and legs. Though the exact cause of alopecia areata is unknown, it is thought to be an autoimmune disorder causing the body’s immune system to attack its own hair follicles, resulting in hair loss.
Roughly 2% of the world’s population suffers from alopecia areata and approximately 5% of these have a family history of "alopecia", the medical term for hair loss.
Diagnosing Alopecia Areata
Alopecia areata is normally diagnosed through the observation of symptoms. However, occasionally a scalp biopsy or blood tests may be performed.
Treating Alopecia Areata
There is no cure for alopecia areata and current treatments, while sometimes effective, offer limited success. Current treatments for alopecia areata include; steroid injections, topical corticosteroids (steroid hormonesnaturally produced in the adrenal cortex of vertebrates), topical immunotherapy, Rogaine(minoxidil) and ultraviolet light therapy.
Although permanent hair loss is a possibility, the course of the disease is unpredictable and varies from patient to patient. The good news is that, even without treatment and after many years,the hair follicles do remain viable and ready to resume normal hair production if and when they receive the appropriate signal. Hair regrowth may, and often does, occur in time.
Are Alopecia Areata Patients Good Candidates for Hair Transplantation?
Patients suffering from alopecia areata are rarely considered good candidates for hair transplant surgery because donor hair grafts harvested from the “safe” zone at the rear and sides of the scalp are still vulnerable to the effects of the body’s immune system once transplanted to the recipient sites. However, if the affected area is small, has remained unchanged for an extended period of time and if there is no sign of inflammation below the scalp, hair transplantation may be an option. This would require a thorough consultation with a skilled and experienced hair restoration surgeon and the patient would need to fully understand and accept the risks of such a procedure.
Adapting to and Living with Alopecia Areata
Depending upon the severity of the condition, hair loss concealers like Toppik, Nanogen and DermMatch may help disguise bald patches. In more severe cases, a hair replacement system or full wig may be necessary.
Aswith all forms of hair loss, patients suffering from alopecia areata may experience emotional and psychological trauma. It’s important to reach out to family and friends, join an alopecia support group and/or seek the services of a mental health professional if you are experiencing intense, prolonged and overwhelming psychological effects.
