Maximum number of grafts in a lifetime?

[gillenator]

Thank you for such a considered response Gillenator. There's plenty of food for thought there - I am a bit worried about the size of the scar and I guess the size difference between a 3500 grafts to 5000 grafts is significant and I would be interested to hear about graft survival from mega sessions. You are right with the subtle transition - ideally i'd not want to draw a great deal of attention to myself and I am still weighing up the pros and cons. I'm not sure i'd want to go through the procedure again and thought 5000 was a nice compromise, i can add volume to the front and strategically place 1500 - 2000 grafts on my crown to break up the massive bald patch but there cons include massive scar, more dramatic change in appearance (i think i can bluff my way through a reasonable change as I've told friends about a "magic pill" and i'm using toppik to great effect) and now i guess i have to factor in the graft survival rate.

I'd certainly love to discuss these pros and cons a bit further....

Prodigy,

You're very welcome my friend. Listen, I forgot to address something for you. It is good that you were assessed to have good donor density. But remember, you must also have the "available laxity" that is left after each procedure. In other words, a doctor can assess your donor zone and state that you may have up to 8,000 harvestable grafts by conventional strip methods. Keep in mind you must maintain the scalp laxity to continue excising those strips in the future. With FUE added in the equation, a patient can have far more grafts harvested by extraction, not excision. Further, an experienced FUE surgeon can harvest from the parietal (side) zones as well as the occipital (rear) donor zones. Scalp laxity is not an issue with FUE.

And listen my friend, if you want to converse in depth about this, feel free to send me an email for my home/office number and we can chat further by phone. I can talk faster than I type if you know what I mean.

You can also email me some pics in strict privacy and confidence for a more precise opinion. Guys do this all of the time. And no one else will have access to them. You have my word.