Looking for Some Thoughts

[Tracy C]

Guess what I am saying is your results may vary depending on your mpb....

The results of any medication can vary from person to person - and often does. There is no such thing as "one size fits all" in medicine. We can guesstimate the average response, but that is the best medical science can do. The human body is a very complicated thing. That's one of the reasons why studies take so dang long.

[WarLord]

Are you saying that in 30 years I will definitely still be responding well to Finasteride? Excellent!

Have you ever heard that some men never go bald? Why would it be "inevitable"? It only depends on, how much the medication increases the resistance of follicles to DHT. And two effective medications - minoxidil and dutasteride - are dose-dependent, so in theory, losing hair is no longer possible, once you react positively and you apply a certain "optimal" dosage. Unfortunately, minoxidil is routinely available only in the 5% version that is apparently sub-optimal for many people.

[WarLord]

I agree with you in theory, but sometimes minox alone does slow down loss, it seems to depend on how aggressive your mpb is. Minox is not supposed to stop the mpb process but it can buy you a lot of time -least for me and some of the others here.

I have always heard 10 years as the average for Fin but like you mentioned I have heard from others (on ************) who have stopped recession and had their vertex fill in and stay that way for 15 years . And just on Fin.
Guess what I am saying is your results may vary depending on your mpb....

I am amazed, how easily you are pulling all these numbers out of your asses. When I started my anti-hairloss treatment in 1997, I didn't care about any numbers. I hoped that it would work forever, if I apply it disciplinedly. And so far it has worked, as I supposed. Why should it stop working, after all? People take some medications for decades. Why should anti-hairloss medications be an exception? Have you ever heard doctors saying that some medication will work for only a certain number of years? How silly it is!

It was only after I found the first hairloss forum in 2007, when I started to read all those stories about "the loss of efficiacy".

[WarLord]

The idea that these treatments have a time limit is a myth generated and perpetuated by widespread misinterpretation of the available data. There is no set time limit. Sure the effectiveness can seem to fade away sooner for others than for most - but that does not always happen and the time until it happens, if it does happen, is not carved in stone. I know males who have been treating their hair loss with these two treatments for over 15 years and these treatments are still working for them.

Finasteride and Minoxidil do two completely different things. Finasteride slows down or prevents further loss, Minoxidil stimulates regrowth. Between the two, Finasteride is more effective at it's job than Minoxidil is at it's job. However, when used together, that gives a male the best chances possible to arrest the loss and regrow some hair. If a man were to choose only one of those two treatments, the best choice is to start with is Finasteride, not Minoxidil. This is because Minoxidil does not do anything to slow down or arrest the loss.

We are very close to more effective treatments and possibly an outright cure. Closer than we have ever been before. It does not matter how long a person thinks that time will come, the current treatments are very likely to help a male hold on until they do become available - with time to spare.

Tracy, this is probably the only your post, with which I agree 90%. Those remaining 10% concern the silly myth perpetuated over and over again about minoxidil.

[WarLord]

Yes, that's what I'm saying.

Anecdotally there are reports of it losing some efficacy, but in that situation people usually up the dose to "compensate".

You also need to take into account that in thirty years time there WILL be a far more effective treatment for MPB, so you probably wouldn't even need it to last that long.

In theory, a dual 5-AR blocker like dutasteride should work infinitely. However, with finasteride, you will quickly hit a wall that is almost impossible to overcome, and this limit of the DHT suppression is not a long-term guarantee of success (in a minority of users, though).

[mpb47]

I am amazed, how easily you are pulling all these numbers out of your asses. When I started my anti-hairloss treatment in 1997, I didn't care about any numbers. I hoped that it would work forever, if I apply it disciplinedly. And so far it has worked, as I supposed. Why should it stop working, after all? People take some medications for decades. Why should anti-hairloss medications be an exception? Have you ever heard doctors saying that some medication will work for only a certain number of years? How silly it is!

It was only after I found the first hairloss forum in 2007, when I started to read all those stories about "the loss of efficiacy".

I am amazed that you think that on minox alone you will never lose ground.

[WarLord]

I am amazed that you think that on minox alone you will never lose ground.

And why should I "lose ground"? It's the same old song sung by Bryan the Baldy, isn't it? Minoxidil won't maintain hair, because it doesn't address the underlying cause, blah blah, blah...

It seems that you have problems with logical thinking, don't you? Or do you want to tell me that minoxidil is not an anti-hairloss treatment, that it doesn't regrow hair? Do you agree that it regrows hair? Do you? And when it regrows hair, it means that it is able to interfere with the process of balding. What do you think? It is so difficult to understand? Or should I explain it even in a more detailed way?

Minoxidil keeps your hair in the growth phase, probably by counterbalancing PGD2/PGE2 ratio, which is the direct cause of hairloss, as we recently learn. DHT stands at the root of the problem, but you don't need to address DHT to stop hairloss. It is only one part in the chain of events leading to the follicle's destruction. If it were so simple, you would regrow 100% of your hair after blocking DHT.

BTW, there are people maintaining their hair on minoxidil for 20-25 years. Some of them are still above baseline. Do you own a time machine and can you tell them that they will inevitably lose hair one day?

Your statement is completely fabricated and actually at variance even with those few long-term minoxidil studies that we have at disposal. It is one of poisonous fallacies infecting internet hairloss forums.

[mpb47]

And why should I "lose ground"? It's the same old song sung by Bryan the Baldy, isn't it? Minoxidil won't maintain hair, because it doesn't address the underlying cause, blah blah, blah...

It seems that you have problems with logical thinking, don't you? Or do you want to tell me that minoxidil is not an anti-hairloss treatment, that it doesn't regrow hair? Do you agree that it regrows hair? Do you? And when it regrows hair, it means that it is able to interfere with the process of balding. What do you think? It is so difficult to understand? Or should I explain it even in a more detailed way?

Minoxidil keeps your hair in the growth phase, probably by counterbalancing PGD2/PGE2 ratio, which is the direct cause of hairloss, as we recently learn. DHT stands at the root of the problem, but you don't need to address DHT to stop hairloss. It is only one part in the chain of events leading to the follicle's destruction. If it were so simple, you would regrow 100% of your hair after blocking DHT.

BTW, there are people maintaining their hair on minoxidil for 20-25 years. Some of them are still above baseline. Do you own a time machine and can you tell them that they will inevitably lose hair one day?

Your statement is completely fabricated and actually at variance even with those few long-term minoxidil studies that we have at disposal. It is one of poisonous fallacies infecting internet hairloss forums.

You say all of this, yet you admit you have gone on propecia. So which is it?

[WarLord]

You say all of this, yet you admit you have gone on propecia. So which is it?

First of all, I wanted to get back the hair that I had lost in the spring last year, after the sudden switch from 10% to 5% minoxidil. After a 13-months' experiment, it was clear to me that minoxidil alone - in whatever strength - can't regrow much hair, at least in my temples.

Second, the long-term effect of minoxidil can't be predicted from any numbers. I have kept my hair on 5% minoxidil for 15+ years, others for 20-25 years, but nobody has used this stuff for more than 25+ years, so the long-term efficiacy of 5% minoxidil is not known. We don't know, how much - if any - men can keep their hair on this relatively low concentration until the end of their lives.

In the case of 5-AR blockers, the long-term effectiveness can be predicted, because a stuff like dutasteride will suppress your DHT on the level of 5-years' old boys. This guarantees you a virtually lifelong safety, especially when combined with minoxidil. Well, I could progressively increase the strength of minoxidil solutions, to be ahead of the process, but there aren't any reliable suppliers of 5+ % minoxidil (big manufacturers), on which you could rely long-term. Only private doctors and companies that can emerge and disappear quickly. Therefore, it was clear to me that 5-AR blockers is the only safe way to go.

BTW, after a 3-months' pause from minoxidil, your look should already be approaching that of inspector Kojak (or a cancer patient). If it doesn't, then it means that this stuff has never really worked in you.

[WarLord]

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