AAPE/Harg treatment/clinics in Japan

[Closingfields]

Well don't know what you have experienced but I have seen more than positive results, also you can get AAPE online just search AAPE for hair, I got mine from www.hairstemstore.com.

[robodoc]

I appreciate you optimism but I have to stick with my comments. Not the slightest change in hair loss or hair growth if you prefer. As I said I suspect this is another ineffective product and as I said I will continue injecting until my supply is gone. I use the newest BD insulin syringe with a very short needle and inject into the dermis, not subcutaneously. I inject it all over the scalp and do it every 3 weeks.

I would expect any sign of hair growth or less hair loss if it was effective to any degree. Since the studies suggest injecting every 3-4 weeks why would you inject 3 times a week? Do you have any basis for injecting 3 times a wek? Why aren't you using AAPE if you feel so sure of your comments? Fat cells in the wild......thanks for comments.

[Neko]

Based on my experience with AAPE, the company sales person and results, I would say this is another impotent cure. I have injected it since May 22 and I have notice zero results. While I did not expect hair sprouting up everywhere, I have seen no change, nada, since I started using it.

Sure AAPE will take months to work, some will say, like the sales dept, my guess this is another product of theory and not real results. Stem cells or substances derived from stem cells, all sounds great but really I think it ends there.

You may very well be correct about it being ineffective but nameless is absolutely right. 3 months is too early to write it off. On the sites of the Japanese doctors that sell it they claim 3 months is sometimes short enough to see results but they usually say the 4-6 month period is when you start to see results.

The reason I made this thread is because if the doctors are to be believed then HARG (I'm sorry to say that I'm not actually totally clear what the difference is, if any, between HARG and AAPE) is not just theory but something that has been used for over five years in 190 clinics and has treated over 2000 patients, 99% successfully. Based on what I've been able to dig up online I can now say I simply do not believe this. My best guess at this point is that it's basically a fancy (and outrageously expensive) treatment that probably has a similar level of success as minoxidil. I want to stress though that this is based purely on anecdotal evidence from the internet in a language where my reading comprehension is far from perfect. Common sense tells me however that if it were anywhere near as good as the doctors claim it would be far more widely known than it is (my hair dresser had never heard of it and she seemed to have heard of just about everything else including lasers which aren't even sold here yet). On the other hand it was completely ineffective it's kind of hard to imagine it's use would have expanded as much as it has. 190 clinics is not insignificant and at the price they sell it at it's hard to imagine they could get away with it if it didn't have decent results for some people. Then again, the social customs in this country tend to create a fatalistic attitude among the populace. It's hard to imagine a group of dissatisfied customers actually putting themselves out there to try to publicly take a doctor or company on for selling bullshit. Particularly when it comes to something like hair loss which is a way more embarrassing subject for men here than in the west (and yes I am serious about that nearly every single man in this country with hair loss is as upset and ashamed about it as the members on this board who are obviously at the extreme in representing western hair loss sufferers).

At any rate I'm sorry I've not been able to be more informative. When I first started researching this I really thought I had found something that might have been of use. now i'm not so sure. I'm doubtful that I'll actually go through with getting the treatment done but I do plan to eventually visit a clinic. First I am going to find a hair loss specialist who doesn't offer HARG, get them to examine me etc.. ask him about all treatments etc. I'm fairly certain he'll listen to me impatiently for about 2 seconds and tell me that HARG is bullshit before physically trying to shove propecia down my throat. Then I'll go to a clinic that offers HARG and they'll be kind and patient and hospitable and promise that after one course of treatment I'll have hair like Stalin and won't have to worry about a single hair ever falling from my head again. Knowing my pathetic sales resistance I'll probably end up doing both.

[nameless]

Based on my experience with AAPE, the company sales person and results, I would say this is another impotent cure. I have injected it since May 22 and I have notice zero results. While I did not expect hair sprouting up everywhere, I have seen no change, nada, since I started using it.

Sure AAPE will take months to work, some will say, like the sales dept, my guess this is another product of theory and not real results. Stem cells or substances derived from stem cells, all sounds great but really I think it ends there.

May 22nd. That means you've been injecting it 3 months. And you expect hair growth already. Please!!!!!

Also, how often do you inject it? Keep in mind that naturally in the wild your fat cells are delivering these same growth factors to the follicles on a continual basis so if you are injecting once a month that is no comparison to the frequency that nature is sending these growth factors to the follicles. I would be injecting these growth factors at least 3 times a week...maybe more often than that.

But right now at this point I'm going to kick back and wait to see what news comes from the 2015 hair loss congress about SM04554 and Shiseido's cells.

[robodoc]

AAPE another bogus product?

Based on my experience with AAPE, the company sales person and results, I would say this is another impotent cure. I have injected it since May 22 and I have notice zero results. While I did not expect hair sprouting up everywhere, I have seen no change, nada, since I started using it.

Sure AAPE will take months to work, some will say, like the sales dept, my guess this is another product of theory and not real results. Stem cells or substances derived from stem cells, all sounds great but really I think it ends there.

[LMS]

Sorry for the late reply and sorry for putting a damper on your morning.

http://chiebukuro.search.yahoo.co.jp/search?p=harg&class=1&aq=-1&oq=&dnum=2078467508&ei=UTF-8

This is a link to the hair loss/ hair care section of the Japanese Yahoo answers with "harg" search results (ordered by relevance).

Basically most of the threads are about people asking for recommendations of a good clinic and asking if the treatment worked for anybody out there. of people that respond a lot of them will share their experience and a majority are people either saying that it didn't do anything for them or that they had just started the treatment. It seems pretty rare for people to reply with positive experiences though it does occasionally happen. For those who do claim positive results they often are on propecia as well or they are women. basically nobody gives pictures either way. I'll keep looking around but been pretty lazy and uninterested in hair loss bullshit for the last couple of weeks. I'm honestly leaning towards just biting the bullet and getting on Propecia. For what I'm trying to achieve (just maintenance) it seems all in all the best option for me. Scared of sides but figure with a positive mind and a healthier lifestyle perhaps those can be avoided or at least mitigated.

Ahh well can't blame you for not wanting to drop $10k for a treatment which seems to work minorly at best.

I'll continue with my self injections and hopefully between me and nofintowin we'll have some sort of idea of what AAPE is capable of, if anything.

[Neko]

That sucks man really put a damper on my morning. Could you maybe post some links where you found these comments? I really thought if there's clinical studies behind AAPE it should be legit... But guess I might've been wrong.

Sorry for the late reply and sorry for putting a damper on your morning.

http://chiebukuro.search.yahoo.co.jp/search?p=harg&class=1&aq=-1&oq=&dnum=2078467508&ei=UTF-8

This is a link to the hair loss/ hair care section of the Japanese Yahoo answers with "harg" search results (ordered by relevance).

Basically most of the threads are about people asking for recommendations of a good clinic and asking if the treatment worked for anybody out there. of people that respond a lot of them will share their experience and a majority are people either saying that it didn't do anything for them or that they had just started the treatment. It seems pretty rare for people to reply with positive experiences though it does occasionally happen. For those who do claim positive results they often are on propecia as well or they are women. basically nobody gives pictures either way. I'll keep looking around but been pretty lazy and uninterested in hair loss bullshit for the last couple of weeks. I'm honestly leaning towards just biting the bullet and getting on Propecia. For what I'm trying to achieve (just maintenance) it seems all in all the best option for me. Scared of sides but figure with a positive mind and a healthier lifestyle perhaps those can be avoided or at least mitigated.

[LMS]

Just completed my 4th set of injections tonight. No visible improvement as of starting "treatment" 9 weeks ago.

[Sogeking]

Thank you for informing us Neko.

[LMS]

After a couple more weeks of searching online Japanese message boards I have to say the results don't look terribly promising. There are a lot of people claiming it didn't do anything for them. Worse yet a lot of the ones who claim positive results say they were also on propecia...

Not ready to completely write it off yet though. I asked my hairdresser about it and she'd never heard of it but said she'd look into it and ask others. I think tomorrow I will go to a dermatologist that i've been to before for something else and seemed all right and ask him about what treatments are best for me.

That sucks man really put a damper on my morning. Could you maybe post some links where you found these comments? I really thought if there's clinical studies behind AAPE it should be legit... But guess I might've been wrong.

[Neko]

After a couple more weeks of searching online Japanese message boards I have to say the results don't look terribly promising. There are a lot of people claiming it didn't do anything for them. Worse yet a lot of the ones who claim positive results say they were also on propecia...

Not ready to completely write it off yet though. I asked my hairdresser about it and she'd never heard of it but said she'd look into it and ask others. I think tomorrow I will go to a dermatologist that i've been to before for something else and seemed all right and ask him about what treatments are best for me.

[LMS]

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4379938/

That is a link to one clinical study in English (it's been posted on this site before). That being said there have also been clinical studies that have demonstrated effectiveness for other kinds of treatment like LLLT which most customers find does basically nothing from what I can tell.

I think Harg is probably a little more proven than PRP. It's been around as a hairloss treatment for longer (at least in Japan) and the number of clinics offering it has risen along with the number of patients taking it. If it was completely ineffective for everybody I don't think this would happen.

You are of course correct to be skeptical though. If i had to guess I'd say that Harg probably offers modest results in a fair number of people but probably won't work well for guys with aggressive hair loss. In my case since my hair loss is relatively mild and my family history suggests that it won't be be too aggressive I think it might be worth the cost for me. If it just helps me maintain for 3 years or so that would be worth 5-10 thousand dollars. Of course since my hair loss is mild and I don't expect massive regrowth either way it would be difficult to measure success if i do the treatment unless it's either a wild success or a total failure.

Ahh that's the study I wanted to show nofintowin.

Does that 49 year old man case not look below baseline at 4 months in? And maybe only slightly above baseline at 10 months in. Though at 2 years 1 month in his results are imo pretty astounding.

That's why I'm 2 months in, seeing no sign of improvement but still remain cautiously optimistic. Nofintowin keep going man, AAPE might be a long game.

[Neko]

All I really want is for AAPE to maintain my current hair side effect free. If it can accomplish that then I can get an FUE and essentially be "cured"

Word

I really hope it works for you. Lot's of respect for you for having the initiative and expertise to track this down for a reasonable price and do it yourself. If it doesn't work then at least you have the satisfaction of knowing you took action without having to hand serious cash over to a potential scam artist.

[LMS]

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4379938/

That is a link to one clinical study in English (it's been posted on this site before). That being said there have also been clinical studies that have demonstrated effectiveness for other kinds of treatment like LLLT which most customers find does basically nothing from what I can tell.

I think Harg is probably a little more proven than PRP. It's been around as a hairloss treatment for longer (at least in Japan) and the number of clinics offering it has risen along with the number of patients taking it. If it was completely ineffective for everybody I don't think this would happen.

You are of course correct to be skeptical though. If i had to guess I'd say that Harg probably offers modest results in a fair number of people but probably won't work well for guys with aggressive hair loss. In my case since my hair loss is relatively mild and my family history suggests that it won't be be too aggressive I think it might be worth the cost for me. If it just helps me maintain for 3 years or so that would be worth 5-10 thousand dollars. Of course since my hair loss is mild and I don't expect massive regrowth either way it would be difficult to measure success if i do the treatment unless it's either a wild success or a total failure.

All I really want is for AAPE to maintain my current hair side effect free. If it can accomplish that then I can get an FUE and essentially be "cured"

[Neko]

Online reviews and testimonials are very easy to fake. I tried the links you posted, but I don't speak Japanese. There don't seem to be any before and after photos. I also wouldn't rely on articles in the popular press or that appear on websites devoted to beauty and cosmetics. The reporting is often uninformed and the writers are more interested in clickbait traffic than reporting facts. I have to question what they mean when they say "clinically proven." Where, when, and by whom? How was efficacy demonstrated?

This sounds like what happened with ACELL/PRP. At one point it was thought these might lead to exciting new treatments with hair regeneration, but their benefit is marginal, if that, but that hasn't stopped docs everywhere from pushing them and charging $$$$ for something that is unproven.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4379938/

That is a link to one clinical study in English (it's been posted on this site before). That being said there have also been clinical studies that have demonstrated effectiveness for other kinds of treatment like LLLT which most customers find does basically nothing from what I can tell.

I think Harg is probably a little more proven than PRP. It's been around as a hairloss treatment for longer (at least in Japan) and the number of clinics offering it has risen along with the number of patients taking it. If it was completely ineffective for everybody I don't think this would happen.

You are of course correct to be skeptical though. If i had to guess I'd say that Harg probably offers modest results in a fair number of people but probably won't work well for guys with aggressive hair loss. In my case since my hair loss is relatively mild and my family history suggests that it won't be be too aggressive I think it might be worth the cost for me. If it just helps me maintain for 3 years or so that would be worth 5-10 thousand dollars. Of course since my hair loss is mild and I don't expect massive regrowth either way it would be difficult to measure success if i do the treatment unless it's either a wild success or a total failure.