ACell, a Current Review of Applications in Hair Transplant Surgery

[Spanish Dude]

autoplucking yield--The contradictions

@Dr. Cooley, I have found, what appear to be, severe contradictions between your different posts, here at BTT, regarding the autoplucking success rate (yield).

On 2010-Oct-28, amidst enthusiasm after your Acell prestentation, you said that autoplucking yield was:
40-50% in scar tissue and 50%-75% in normal tissue.
You also said that these figures were improving steadily.
I think you confirmed these figures to Dr. Rassman by phone (he posted about it in his blog)

But now, 3 months later, you say that plucked hairs don't grow well in scar tissue, and you are extremely dissapointed with this.
You say that success in scar tissue is "ocassional".
You also say that you have learned this problem in the last 12 months (after your patient, "ejj",'s surgery).
Furthermore, when you talk about autoplucking in general (not in scar tissue) you say that, currently, this is only a method for "desperate and adventurous people".
You also have said that autocloning labour cost is twice the cost of FUT, so this is labourwise, a totally viable procedure, and only yield is the decisive factor. This doesn't seem to be as "extremely tedious" as dr. Hitzig says.


Could you explain all these apparent contradictions?
thanks-SD

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COPY OF YOUR POSTS (Dr. COOLEY)
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http://www.baldtruthtalk.com/showthread.php?p=17505#post17505

Cooley, 2010.Oct-28, 12:17 AM
I wish I had an exact % to give you. My success was much lower in the beginning but has steadily risen. Currently about 75% in a healthy recipient bed, and 40-50% in scar; because we keep refining the technique, I expect these numbers to rise.

http://www.baldtruthtalk.com/showthread.php?p=17505#post17505

Cooley: 2010.Oct-28, 12:44 AM
1. Success rate: 50-75% in healthy scalp, 40-50% in scar; we're actively trying ways to raise the success rate.

http://www.baldtruthtalk.com/showthread.php?t=4308&page=4

Cooley, 2011.Jan.31, 07:46 PM
1) We performed about 600 plucked beard grafts throughout this area. I have not seen the patient in person but from the photographs it appears that virtually none of them grew. We have since (1 YEAR AGO) learned that plucked grafts do not grow well in scars and that the wider and denser the scar tissue, the lower the success. I understand the disappointment and upset by the patient as I too am extremely disappointed by the failure of the plucked grafts to grow in scar tissue.

http://www.baldtruthtalk.com/showthread.php?t=3998&page=20

Cooley, 2011.Feb.01, 04:48 PM
We were not simply 'waking up' miniaturized follicles, but creating entirely new ones. The occasional success in scar tissue also supports this.

http://www.baldtruthtalk.com/showthread.php?t=3998&page=20

Cooley, 2011.Feb-01, 03:09 PM
We do not recommend the plucked grafting as a replacement for FUT or FUE at this time... So when do we do the plucked grafts? We do them for what I call the "desparate" or the "adventurous".

[wolvie1985]

Spanishdude, once again your paranoid, accusatory tone and ramblings have embarrassed the rest of this community and undermine the good will between honest, noble doctors and hair loss sufferers.

This is why your reputation precedes you in every hair loss forum you've trolled. Please, seek help and stay off the boards.

[Spanish Dude]

Spanishdude, once again your paranoid, accusatory tone and ramblings have embarrassed the rest of this community and undermine the good will between honest, noble doctors and hair loss sufferers.

This is why your reputation precedes you in every hair loss forum you've trolled. Please, seek help and stay off the boards.

I have just reported you to the admins.

[RichardDawkins]

Spanish Dude there is one little little problem in your post :-) You did let slip the most important fact here

Those plucked hairs in the scar tissue were Beard Hair and not scalp hair.

And everybody knows that beard and bodyhair is well how can i say this crap. I really believe in infinite donor pretty soon and Acell and everything else what Hm has to offer but I dont believe in bodyhair.

But i like that Dr Cooley and Dr Hitzig are actually put there heads in the line here and discuss even things that went wrong (like ejj´s case for example)

@Spencer : Nobody is accusing Dr Hitzig and Dr Cooley here when it comes to lawsuits, it is more a fear of hairloss sufferes, that if Cooley and Hitzig or others do in fact define the plucking technique (like in my number example or even better then that) some as*hole from the netherlands is pulling a lawsuit or anything else on this, only because he thinks his "patent" (which btw is so generally written that even i could be sued if i tried to put hairs in a ECm solution) is violated.

And even you should know what this would mean. That we have to wait a lot of more years even with a solution practically at hand or at head.

Cause lets be honest here, and i dont wanna sound rude. But the plucking thing in combination with ECM well is no miracle if cell tissue is stick to the hair. Its the logical conclusion here to go this way.

Cause all it takes to get "expanded donor" sorry Dr Hitzig i dont like this term because it speaks plucking with Acell lower then it is in reality. And you guys should really be more "agressive" when it comes to the thing called "infinite donor".

[Spanish Dude]

@RichardDawkins:

no Richard, the data I have posted is not for beard hair, but for scalp hair.

In Oct 2010, dr. Cooley said that yield was (on average) 45% for plucked scalp hair, planted in scar tissue, and that yield was improving. And yield was 62% (on average), for healthy tissue. So the difference between healthy and scar tissue was not so terribly big.

But now he says that he is extremely disappointed with the yield of plucked hair (scalp hair) planted in scar tissue. Also, it seems that now Cooley is also disappointed with the yield in normal tissue, because he says that autoplucking is only for the "desperate and adventurous". Otherwise he would have said that "autoplucking is fine, except for scar tissue".
And also, according to Cooley's words, it seems that plucked hairs not only require to be planted on healthy tissue, but also require healthy follicles around to get stem cells from. According to this, autoplucking would not work in bald scalp.

Note that dr. Cooley is offering patient "ejj", FUE as solution, and not autoplucking, despite the facts that:
1. his donor is almost totally depleted, to the point that Cooley will have to FUE ejj's beard!
2. "ejj"'s scars are soft, not hard (and thus, should be more receptible for plucked hairs).

Also note that the 600 plucked beards planted on ejj, were not planted on scar tissue. It was a "shock fall" tissue, according to ejj.

I am still waiting for dr. Cooley to confirm if he has really performed 4000 autoplucked hairs on a london patient. He must have been very confident, when he went for such a big session. Why not reporting this case?

[RichardDawkins]

He is disappointed by ejj result with plucked hairs not plcuked hairs in general.

Didnt you get this wrong? Not the plucked hairs need follicles around them, the follicles need auto plucked hairs around them to resolve in new follicles. The other way around it may see very strange.

As you may know, this technique is actually pretty new and needs some touch ups to get reliable.

And also the yield rate should be noted as a basic one because every scalp is different. And in ejj case there were severe scars at his head which have traumatized the head.

And i believe ejj said "The problem he had with this is, that the scar healed good but now its just tissue, blank tissue".

I think Dr Cooley is talking about this specific case here and not in general.

But well lets see what he has to say.

[Bakez]

Lets be honest I think responding to a bunch of mentalists on a forum are the last of his worries. I just hope he is on to something and doesnt get put off by people scrutinising every bit of info he makes available, tbh its probably the reason why they dont release photos or results - because mental hairloss sufferers on the internet end up asking 40 question for each statement and if they dont get answered we start claiming it is snake oil.

Just hope that in 5 years his methods will have been developed by him, someone else, or a group of doctors into something special

[RichardDawkins]

Dont say 5 years, this shocks people and makes them post more nonsense :-)

[Spanish Dude]

@Richard:

Regarding problems in bald scalp, yes, maybe I infered too far. But forum member "Bakez" also pointed in that direction. Maybe Cooley could give us a yield figure for bald&healthy scalp versus hairy&healthy scalp.

Regarding yield in scar tissue.
In this matter, there is no doubt. Cooley has said that he has learned, *since ejj's case*, that plucked hairs don't grow well in scar tissue. So he is not just talking about ejj's case. Also, in a non-related post, he has said that growth in scar tissue is "occasional".

@Bakez:
this is not a matter of mentalism, this is a basic, clear, contradiction re. yield on scar tissue.

[RichardDawkins]

naaaahhh no bad blood here. I can understand that people are very tipsy right now, because if this works, well our fears are finally over then, thats for sure.

And i think the problem right now is not the IF (it could work) but more the HOW (to increase efficiency).

But seriously just sit down for ten minutes and play the whole thing called Plucking with Acell through just play it through and ask yourself can it work or not.

I bet you will come to the conclusion that everything depends on the HOW right now.

Believe if the rsults come in and they can life up to their hype, i will be the first to do it. In combination with FUE (but only with adding Acell cause i simply wanna increase the chance of donor regrow) well and for the rest i would just wait for Histogen.

End of story, but one thing for sure, i will never go for FUT cause iam really afraif of those operations

[KeepHoping]

Post from a different thread

Gubter_87 wrote:

Actually I am surprised why Spencer did not ask Dr. Hitzig that exact question.
If hair loss is due to lack of progenitor cells and Dr. Hitzig believes that A-cell combined with PRP injections will by pass this, then why does not hair grow everywhere?

Hopefully Dr. Hitzig will find his way to this forum post and be able to give us an answer!

I think this a good question for Dr. Hitzig and I'm interested to find out the answer myself as well. Any thoughts?

[RichardDawkins]

It is a good question and iam really hyped to see the answers

[SilverSurfer]

Silver Surfer

It has been an interesting time for me, with widespread interest, as well as criticism and even threats of lawsuits. Nevertheless I am pushing forward because I believe in the ACell technology and plucked technique to genuinely help those with hairloss. It will certainly be refined over time as more knowledge is gained of stem cells and ECM, and methods to jumpstart the follicle regeneration process are discovered. It is an exciting time in our field.

Dr Cooley

Dr Cooley and Dr Hitzig,
Sorry for the misunderstanding, I was referring to the factors mentioned in this paragraph(criticism and even threats of lawsuits). In no way was I implying something else. Again thanks for all the advancements you have created, personally I feel this will be the solution (Autoplucking)for my problems and all those who have had their donnor depleted.

[RichardDawkins]

Not only for depleated donor guys :-)

[HairRobinHood]

Not only for depleated donor guys :-)

Does it mean for depleted pockets too?