Anyone know what is Shock Loss?

[John P. Cole, MD]

Narnia, I am very sorry to hear about your situation. Isolated crown loss in females is not common. Typically, hair loss in females begins in the front behind the hairline and progresses backward while retaining the frontal hairline. Only later does the loss involve the crown area. I wonder if something else is going on in your case.

Neograft usually goes together with an assistant doing the entire surgery. Seldom does the physician get involved in the case. Most physicians, who use Neograft have no idea how to perform a transplant. Many are plastic surgeons, who consider this very complex surgery simplistic. In fact, a hair transplant surgery takes many more hours than any surgery these plastic surgeons perform.

The first thing to ask your surgeon is who did the surgery? If it was an assistant, I'd start by asking for a full refund.

Before I go further, it is important to answer your primary concern. Your hair should grow back over time in full. Shock loss is temporary. Progressive hair loss is not. Progressive hair loss tends to occur in waves like falling of one plateau and landing on another one that lasts for a period of time. Then you fall off that plateau and land with less hair again. This sort of hair loss does not return. Shock loss does return. Your history does suggest shock loss.

I learned something many years ago in females. Don't maximally pack grafts because this predisposes individuals to shock loss. Shock loss in females is devastating. It is bad in men. It is devastating in women.

What can you do? There is no data to suggest that you can do anything. We could try many things such as high-quality PRP or lysed platelets, amniotic membrane, fat stem cells, and exosomes. There is no data to support any of these in treating shock loss. You could try topical minoxidil or oral minoxidil. Again, no data to support this. I do think you will feel better doing something. I do know that high-quality products other than minoxidil do promote faster regrowth of grafts. You might do the same with shock loss and I'd expect this.

The real issue is hat your hair will regrow at a slow rate of 1/4 inch per month once it starts. It will not be until the hair is of a stylable length that you will see increased fullness. So, no matter what you need to wait it out.

The maximum graft count I shoot for in women is 1000 grafts. Above this, shock loss seems more common in women. I will say that I see much less shock loss pre-conditioning the scalp with high concentrations of growth factors from lysed platelets.

I would be very interested in trying some regenerative protocols on you to see if we can return you to a more normal state faster. Having said this, you should be ok in about one year from now without these protocols.

I'm sorry to hear what you have been through. I know this is traumatic for anyone, but especially for women.

Dr. Cole