Question about donor reserves

[Gandolf]

I'm relatively new to the discussion here and am a little curious about something. Often, we hear people talk about a patient's "donor supply" or reserves available for HT procedures. When these figures are quoted, do they typically include the total available grafts from JUST strip procedures, or would it include the total of strip procedures and then following up all around the back and sides of the head with a FUE technique.

I am just trying to determine, if one was willing to have multiple procedures, both FUT and FUE, over a lifetime, what maximum amounts of donor supple would be available.

[Follicle Death Row]

From what I've been told and from my research it's kind of something like this nowadays:

Average (assuming no worse than norwood 6):
8000-9000 by strip.
The low end of the spectrum may be 6,000 and the high end up at 10,000 for the freaks.

After strip, 1500-2000 FUE for the average. On the low end 1000, on the high end 2500.

It's highly variable.

[gillenator]

And we must also remember that the patient must have the accomodating scalp laxity to further harvest strips in future procedures. Otherwise the patient has FUE as the only other option.

[Follicle Death Row]

Yeah exactly what Gillenator said. Laxity is so important. You can have great success with scalp laxity exercises too.

[Folly]

Do lax scalps usually provide better scars, due to less tension post-op ? Assuming the strip removed was not too wide of course. Obviously, i know the patients physiology plays a vital role, but do lax scalps generally provide better scars? Thanks.

[Follicle Death Row]

I think it would make sense that less tension would cause less stretching. Still some people just heal a lot better than others and I imagine age can also play a factor. I'm pretty sure strip scars can be very problematic if you're diabetic too because healing is always poor in such patients.