21 considering hair transplant? Any advice tips?

[ukcali]

Hi everyone I am looking for some advice and suggestions.

My hair has been receding and thinning on top since my late teens. I have been using Minoxidil for about a year now and it doesn't appear to be working for me. I had a meeting with my dermatologist a few months back who agreed. Obviously that only leaves Propecia which I have more or less decided not to take as the potential side effects for me is just not something I would want to live with.

So I am now looking into a hair transplant. I have been using Nanogen as a cover up which has worked very well, however the problem is my hair line is receding, especially at my temples & crown + it's thinning on top. Therefore it's getting harder and harder to hide my hair loss. It won't be too long before I can't.

I would like to sort my hairline and temples so it will give me more styling options because at the moment I feel pretty limited.

My questions are:
.Will any surgeons do a transplant on a 21 year old? if not why not? I understand the reasoning behind waiting as long as possible but for me I don't see the benefit it waiting to go complete bald before getting a transplant
.One of my main concerns is about thickens of the transplanted hair. A lot of transplants look quite thing, for example Jason Gardner and Silvio Belisconi both seem to have very thin transplanted hair. What outcome is realistic in terms of thickness.

Any other advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

[ukcali]

Here's a few pictures of my hair. Apologies for the poor quality.

[northeastguy]

ukcali..... I can't think of one active and senior member on this forum who would advise you to have a transplant at 21. since you don't want to use propecia ( same reason I don't, use Beta Sitosterol and/or saw palmetto, nizoral, and Rogaine. Use all three. If you start down the road of a transplant, you have the likelyhood of begining something you can't finish. Sucks to be losing your hair at such a young age, most of us have been there. Just be patient, give those three a chance, or best of all, do nothing.

[Kiwi]

As a long term member of this site I would STRONGLY advise against any kind of FUT transplant.

If you have the money I'd see Dr Gho in Europe and go for his FUE transplant because its scarless in the cosmetic sense that matters.

Just promise you want do FUT!!!

To be honest though I'd just shave it or keep brushing it back like you do. Shaved heads look fine.

[Kiwi]

Oh yeah and I suffered from propecia side effects and got an FUT.

I regret it.

I wish I'd shaved my head and got SMP in Milan from Milana instead. Research her in the cutting edge forums.

[Assemblage23]

Look into concealers and stick to all the possible proven treatments and join the milions of us who check histogen updates everyday.

[aim4hair]

As a long term member of this site I would STRONGLY advise against any kind of FUT transplant.

If you have the money I'd see Dr Gho in Europe and go for his FUE transplant because its scarless in the cosmetic sense that matters.

Just promise you want do FUT!!!

To be honest though I'd just shave it or keep brushing it back like you do. Shaved heads look fine.

This ^

Maybe waiting is the best option for now, but if you don't wanna wait and wanna do something about it now, i believe Gho will be the safest option, because it's scarless which will give you the option of shaving/buzzing your head in the future if your hairloss goes out of control.

[35YrsAfter]

Hi everyone I am looking for some advice and suggestions.

My hair has been receding and thinning on top since my late teens. I have been using Minoxidil for about a year now and it doesn't appear to be working for me. I had a meeting with my dermatologist a few months back who agreed. Obviously that only leaves Propecia which I have more or less decided not to take as the potential side effects for me is just not something I would want to live with.

So I am now looking into a hair transplant. I have been using Nanogen as a cover up which has worked very well, however the problem is my hair line is receding, especially at my temples & crown + it's thinning on top. Therefore it's getting harder and harder to hide my hair loss. It won't be too long before I can't.

I would like to sort my hairline and temples so it will give me more styling options because at the moment I feel pretty limited.

My questions are:
.Will any surgeons do a transplant on a 21 year old? if not why not? I understand the reasoning behind waiting as long as possible but for me I don't see the benefit it waiting to go complete bald before getting a transplant
.One of my main concerns is about thickens of the transplanted hair. A lot of transplants look quite thing, for example Jason Gardner and Silvio Belisconi both seem to have very thin transplanted hair. What outcome is realistic in terms of thickness.

Any other advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

I have seen the approximate age of 29 as the minimum age reputable hair restoration physicians will consider doing a hair transplant on a patient.

My hair looked similar to yours when I was 21. As an older guy, back when I was losing my hair, there were few options available to men losing their hair. It was SO depressing. Rogaine wasn’t even available. Today a shaved head is by far more socially acceptable than when I was in my 20's. Because of the culture back then, someone with a shaved head was looked upon as either an oddball or someone having treatments in a mental facility. Sorry to say, but it's true. Today if you Google; "Women who find bald man sexy", you will see that some women actually prefer bald men. I remember a while back seeing a rather short man who looked like he was in his 30's with a dark fringe and a slick, shiny bald head that kind of came to a point on top. He had his family with him and his wife was a knock-out beauty.
Thanks to Dr. Cole I still have hair at 61 although I'm pretty thin in the back. I have a decent amount of hair in the front and crown that’s nearly all body hair. I recently have taken a different approach to hair care. Instead of babying my hair, I now brush it vigorously and massage my scalp. Although I stopped using Rogaine and Hair Cycle shampoo a couple of years ago, I began using it again about 3 months ago. Recently in two surgeries, Dr. Cole placed about 750 beard hairs in my crown. It will be interesting to see how well that grows. I’m not sure why, but my hair looks thicker than it has in 20 years. My daughter works at a health food warehouse and is always bringing product home for us to try. I have been using a product called “Raw Meal”, drinking purified, non-fluoridated water and using a product called “Cellfood”. Dr. Cole gave me a treatment with ACell during my last two surgeries. ACell is a regenerative medicine. Hair restoration doctors such as Dr. Cooley have noted that ACell encourages vascularization.
As far as maintaining existing hair, I read an interesting and informative article in the Hair Transplant Forum International magazine. Articles in this magazine are written by hair restoration doctors for hair restoration doctors. Evidently according to studies, sunburn, smoking cigarettes and stress are the top hair villains. On the positive side, drinking coffee is good for your hair.

-35YrsAfter works at Dr. Cole's office.

[PatientlyWaiting]

Look into concealers and stick to all the possible proven treatments and join the milions of us who check histogen updates everyday.

I did that, it's depressing. News after news saying "5-10 years away before it hits the US market". It's been 5-10 years away since I lurked the site in 2010, it's now 2013 and I see the same threads, same news over and over again being bumped.

You're 21, if money is not a huge issue, find a real good IAHRS doctor and get your FUT or FUE and at least use Rogaine, but I advise to use both Rogaine and finasteride. Then don't look back. You'll be here waiting and waiting, while follicle after follicle shrink more and more until you're bald and ugly. Go ahead and take their advice about sticking around and reading news, you'll soon see what i'm talking about.

[mattj]

Considering your age and hair loss pattern, I don't think it's advisable to take the HT route just yet. You're very likely to lose a lot more hair from the top within a few years.

I would suggest cutting it shorter, or buzzing it completely if you're comfortable with that look and feel it would suit you (and you don't know until you try).

[drybone]

Hi.

If you are 21 years old, then you are going to go Norwood 7 by the time you are 30 at the most.

I am 47 and have twice as much hair as you do now. I am not trying to be mean. I hope you understand that sometimes cold hard facts are more important than false hope.

Normally, I would not suggest a hair transplant. But in your case I would.

However, you have to start off with an expectation of being completely horse shoe bald, and making a realistic hairline from that. You can still look good as long as you understand you wont have a Norwood 2 hairline . Go take a look at Tom Hanks hairline that he has now.

This is the kind of hairline I would suggest for you. Like Jude Law. This is the kind of transplant I would suggest you tell your surgeon.

I would also suggest you get on finasteride and rogaine immediately to try to save what you have left so you dont need as many grafts.

Hope this helps

[Jasari]

Here's a few pictures of my hair. Apologies for the poor quality.

You'll get mixed advice on this topic. Typically it isn't a good idea to get a hair transplant young because inevitably you will lose more hair and then be playing catch up until your donor supply runs out.

That being said, this current generation is in a unique situation whereby there are likely treatments which at worst should be able to halt hairloss in the foreseeable future i.e (3-5 years).

In that regard it depends on whether you want to roll the dice. You could get a transplant in the knowledge that if none of the new treatments work out, you will have a scar and won't be able to shave down (Unless you get FUE into the scar) or you take a chance and figure the new treatments will be out before I ever have to shave down.

My own personal experience was that I started going bald at 21 - By 25 I figured wasting my 20's (Due to hairloss affecting my self confidence) wasn't worth it - I rolled the dice and got a transplant - I can probably buy another 5 years with another transplant. At the end of the day your going to go bald, all a transplant does is essentially stop your ability to shave down past about a 4 guard. You just have to decide whether the pro out way the cons in 'your' own mind.

[35YrsAfter]

You'll get mixed advice on this topic. Typically it isn't a good idea to get a hair transplant young because inevitably you will lose more hair and then be playing catch up until your donor supply runs out.

That being said, this current generation is in a unique situation whereby there are likely treatments which at worst should be able to halt hairloss in the foreseeable future i.e (3-5 years).

In that regard it depends on whether you want to roll the dice. You could get a transplant in the knowledge that if none of the new treatments work out, you will have a scar and won't be able to shave down (Unless you get FUE into the scar) or you take a chance and figure the new treatments will be out before I ever have to shave down.

My own personal experience was that I started going bald at 21 - By 25 I figured wasting my 20's (Due to hairloss affecting my self confidence) wasn't worth it - I rolled the dice and got a transplant - I can probably buy another 5 years with another transplant. At the end of the day your going to go bald, all a transplant does is essentially stop your ability to shave down past about a 4 guard. You just have to decide whether the pro out way the cons in 'your' own mind.

The main thing I object to is a young man getting a low hairline grafted. When I was 27, my hair looked unbearably thin. If it had been that way when I was 21, I'm not sure I would have wanted to live with that for another eight years. I had an exceptionally dense scalp donor area. I am one of those guys whose donor area thinned over the years. Having surgery done early does run the risk of taking scalp hair in the "safe" zone that will later disappear. That happened to me big time. I remember when I was young, parting my hair low to the point that it looked like a comb-over. That sucked at such a young age. If you have the money, and an intense hatred for hair loss as I did, you may want to plan on having, perhaps 1500 grafts planted per 1-2 years. We have patients who have done this with great results. I spoke with Dr. Cole earlier today about young patients and he has a strict age policy. As a general rule, he doesn't like to do a hair transplant on anyone younger than 29. He has good reasons I know I wouldn't want to hear if I were 21. It's really best to do everything else short of a hair transplant until you reach the age reputable hair restoration surgeons will perform surgery on you.

[ukcali]

Hi everyone, firstly thanks for all of your info and advice it's very much appreciated.

I've been on regaine/Rogaine for about a year and it hasn't helped at all! I would say I've receded slightly but definitely thinned a lot on top. I am happy to keep keep using it but I think the reality is I'm just one of those people it hasn't worked for. In regards to propecia/finasteride, I really don't want to take it unless I have to. The potential side affects are just too great for me to risk.

In regards to the hair transplant, I'm just wondering why would I have to wait until I'm 29 to have the transplant? Is it just simply I may not have enough hair left to completely restore my scalp?
What about using some body hair? Or is that not very reliable/not give good results?
I would be happy to have a transplant every couple years like someone suggested i.e just keep topping it up.

Shaving my head for me would be a last resort as I'm sure many of you can understand.

Thanks again for everyone's help. It's so difficult because I've Always been quite vain (I know I shouldn't admit that!) and up until a few months ago I could just cover the thinning areas no problem but now it's just becoming a daily struggle and I know by summer I probably won't be able to any more.

[aim4hair]

.

Shaving my head for me would be a last resort as I'm sure many of you can understand. (

That's right, this is why if you go for an HT, you should try to avoid having donor scars, cause if you got scars, then even shaving would not be an option along the road if you progress to nw7