3 Questions That Can Calm Your Concerns About Hair Transplant Surgery
About two-thirds of American men suffer from hair loss of varying degrees by the time they’re 35. If treated early, medications like Rogaine or Propecia can help thinning hair to grow thicker and healthier. But by the time hair follicles are dead, hair transplant surgery is the only viable option. The good news is that these surgeries are highly effective and very safe. If you’re curious about hair transplants but worried about the surgery, here are three questions with answers that might ease your mind:
What’s the Best Type of Hair Transplant?
The details of a technique should always be discussed between you and your hair transplant surgeon so you can be sure that you’re getting the best procedure for your needs. But in general, you’ll receive one of two hair transplant methods. In the first, follicular unit transplantation, a narrow strip of the scalp (usually at the back of the head) is removed and dissected into tiny grafts. This is the kind of surgery — although much improved — that has been used in the U.S. for many years.
But a newer technique, called follicular unit extraction, is fast becoming the gold standard in the hair transplant field. In FUE, a hair transplant doctor takes small, individual grafts from several areas on the head, leaving no strip scar at all. This procedure is slightly more expensive in many cases; however, it’s important to keep in mind that hair transplant surgeries are more cost-effective in the long run than other hair loss solutions, and it is often worth paying a little more for a better procedure.
What Is a Celebrity FUE Hair Transplant?
You may have heard of a celebrity FUE hair transplant and wondered how this procedure differs from standard FUE. Basically, a celebrity FUE hair transplant is simply an FUE mini-session, in which a smaller number of grafts (500 to 1,000) are implanted. The surgery only takes about five hours, and the patient’s head does not need to be shaved as it would be in a standard FUE surgery.
Despite its name, a celebrity hair transplant isn’t just for celebrities. If you want to minimize recovery time or keep your surgery private, then a celebrity procedure might be the right choice for you. Its results are more subtle, so you can’t expect to repair severe hair loss in a single session, but subtlety is the whole idea.
Are Hair Transplants Only for Scalp Hair?
Hair transplants can actually be performed in some cases where either the donor or recipient site is not located on the scalp. For example, in a facial hair transplant, beard hair can be used to fill in bald spots on the head. Or, hair from the head can be used for an eyebrow restoration surgery. FUE techniques have expanded to provide many more options than simply taking hair from one part of the head to conceal bald spots and receding hairlines.
What other questions would you like answered? Do you have any concerns about hair transplant surgery?
