Conditions & Diseases: Hair Loss & Hair Loss Treatment (Surgical & Non-Surgical)

Realistic Goals for Hair Transplant Patients

For many women and men considering hair transplant surgery, it represents an opportunity to reverse the aging process and look and feel younger again. While natural looking hair grafts can certainly help achieve that goal, prospective patients should thoroughly discuss their hair transplant expectations, goals and possible results with their doctor before their surgery during your consultation. Having realistic goals about your hair transplant results and working in cooperation with your doctor are the key to satisfaction with your surgery.

The days of unnatural pluggy, barbie doll looking hair transplants are long over, despite how much it's made fun of in the movies.

Hair transplants will also not give you the same look that a hair piece or toupee will. Hair transplant surgery involves transferring hair loss resistant hair from one area to your balding or thinning area. The success of this will depend on many different variables outlined below.

Consultation

Every patient should have a thorough consultation with their hair transplant doctor where his or her goals and possible results are discussed. Before going to your consultation, you should have a list of questions ready to ask your doctor. Perhaps you have researched hair transplants on the internet or discussed it with a friend and have developed a list of questions in your mind. Our Consultation article was written to help prepare you for meeting with hair transplant clinics.

While it is the doctor's responsibility to inform you about (among other things) his skills, experience with other patients and his outline to help you achieve your hair restoration goals, the prospective patient also has a responsibility to educate themselves as much as possible, satisfy all their questions and understand the possible results and limitations of hair transplant surgery for them.

The Variables of your Hair Transplant Results

The final results of your hair transplant surgery are dependent on some main factors:

1. Your age
2. The amount of hair loss you currently have
3. The amount of donor hair available
4. The amount of hair loss you may have in the future
5. Family history of hair loss

Your age plays an important factor for a number of reasons. For example, if you are a 35 year old male, your doctor must consider #2, #3, #4 and #5. With his examination, he should be able to determine the pattern of male hair loss you have and how you will look 10, 20 or even 30 years after your surgery. If you are susceptible to future hair loss, he must take this into consideration when determining the distribution pattern for your implanted hair grafts.

The doctor will also take your age and hair loss into account for when he harvests grafts from your donor area. In this illustration, a man with an extreme case of male pattern hair loss will have far less donor hair to cover a large area of baldness. He does not have enough donor hair to provide a thick, full head of hair. It is worth noting here that just because most men suffer from some degree of typical male pattern hair loss, it does not mean your hair loss will become as extreme as that pictured in the illustration. --- (Norwood Class 7 Hair Loss>>)

Your doctor will probably ask you about your family history of hair loss to determine your genetic predisposition to future hair loss.

Financial Considerations

Your budget and financial considerations play an important role in the outcome of your hair transplant surgery for several reasons. The amount of hair grafts you can afford to have implanted will determine the amount of coverage and thickness you receive. While one surgery is often enough for many patients, many others find that a second or even third procedure is required to achieve the look they desire. Your doctor should be able to tell you whether you will require more then one surgery. Before going ahead with your first surgery, plan and begin budgeting for that second procedure which might come as early as 6 to 12 months later.

In cases where 2 or more surgeries is necessary, the first procedure could be characterized as the "coverage" session. Here, the doctor will probably give you a new hair line and spread the grafts out over your balding area to give you maximum coverage. However, once the new grafts start to grow, this coverage area will be "thin" and it is during the second and sometimes third procedure where the doctor plans to "fill in" and add "density" your existing hair grafts.

If this is the plan your doctor has for you, you must take those follow up hair transplant sessions into financial consideration. If you are not sure if you can afford follow up procedures, financing with low monthly payments is available to most patients. If you are not sure if you have the resources for a second and third procedure and financing doesn't interest you, it might be best to wait on your first surgery as the results you will be left with until you can afford a "filling in" session might be disappointing.

Building the right hairline

While you might have had great hair as a teenager in high school, the hair line you had then may not appropiate for your age if you are in your in 30s, 40s, 50s and even 60s. Hair transplant doctors are professionals that care about their work and giving you a natural looking hair line that is appropiate for your age is important to your results. While the hair line at left, below, might have been appropiate and natural looking when you were a teenager, professional hair transplant doctors with years of experience know that rebuilding a hair line for a 35 year old man is more appropiately demonstrated in the picture below.

In order to achieve a natural looking hair line for a man in his 30, 40s, 50s, hair transplant doctors will try to rebuild a frontal hair line with wide U shape.

In Summary:

While you may not achieve that rock star look or have the same hair line you did as a teenager, hair transplant surgery can help you look younger and feel more confident with a natural looking appearance. The final outcome of your procedure is dependent on variables including age, hair loss, family history, available donor hair and finances. Patients and doctors should thoroughly discuss the procedure during the consultation meeting to satisfy all questions and concerns including goals and how many procedures it will take to achieve those goals. Although patients have a responsibility to educate themselves as much as possible, it is during this dialogue with their doctor that expectations of his or her hair transplant results are made clear.

Article by Staff
OmniMedicalSearch.com

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Realistic Goals
Consultations & Choosing a Doctor
Hair Transplant Post Op Recovery

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