Fabulous Follicles: Hair Transplantation

Hair loss plagues thousands of people and can result in reduced confidence levels. In more severe cases, it can cause severe panic. Most people don’t like to focus on where their hair will be in a few years, and take having a full head of hair for granted.

The number of pills, creams, and other procedures available has spawned a multimillion-dollar industry, with many people buying nearly anything they think will even slightly improve their chances of keeping or growing back their hair. One of the most effective procedures is the hair transplant. This is because it takes already existing hair from one part of the body and puts it somewhere else, typically on the top of the head. While males tend to get more hair procedures than women, it’s not uncommon for females to seek out the procedure due to stress-induced hair loss, or to just garden variety balding caused by genetics. Veraclinic.net keeps a very complete compendium of current hair transplantation knowledge should this article ever become outdated.

There are two main forms of hair transplants which both start and end in similar ways. To start the procedure, the scalp is cleaned. Then a local anaesthetic is applied to the back of the head.

1. Follicular Unit Strip Surgery

This method of hair transplantation, abbreviated as FUSS, involves removing a 6 to 10-inch strip of skin and hair from the back of the head. The scalp is then sewed back shut with the hair around this incision, masking the site where the surgery was undergone.

Next, the medical staff on the doctor’s payroll will divide this strip of hair into hundreds or thousands of individual grafts.

2. Follicular Extraction Surgery

Abbreviated as FUE, follicular extraction surgery involves the medical team shaving the back of the patient’s head, leaving only the hair follicles that will be extracted. These follicles are then extracted one by one with the extraction area, eventually becoming covered again by the patient’s existing hair that wasn’t removed.

Next Step

Regardless of whether the FUSS or the FUE is employed, the next step is to clean and numb the area where these grafts are going to be placed. Either a scalpel or needle is then used to create superficial holes in the scalp in which all of the individual follicles or grafts are then placed.

FUSS hair transplantation will result in the patient having a “full” head of hair much sooner than FUE, since FUE only removes the follicles. This means the hair will have to be given some time to regrow before having the satisfactory final look.

Time for Recovery

Naturally, it’s to be expected that the area in which the procedure was completed to be very tender and delicate during the recovery process. A patient should expect to have their head completely covered by a bandage for at least a day or two post-surgery. Pain medication is very commonly prescribed, so the patient can focus on their lives and not pick at their transplant and increase the risk of the follicles not setting properly.

Some weeks after the surgery, the transplanted hair will fall out. However, this isn’t a cause for concern. The transplant was made to stimulate the growth of new hair entirely. This hair transplant is solving the problem not by putting hair where it wasn’t before, but by “fertilizing” the area, so to speak, to be more hospitable to hair growth than it was before by putting live and healthy follicles in the area.

Hair transplantation is a safe procedure. However, it can be very expensive. Look into all of your local options before settling on a surgeon. This procedure is seldom covered by insurance.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or management of EconoTimes