Proper hair transplant information is important before going for a hair transplantation surgery. Hair transplantation is the process of transplanting hair-bearing portion of the scalp onto the bald area. Recent technological advances have made the operation more convenient, affordable and effective.
Some basic hair transplant facts Hair transplantation operation involves several steps like pre-surgery care, post-operation care.
Pre-surgery care - You are supposed to follow certain pre-operation precautionary measures. For example, you need to follow the list of dos and don'ts provided by the surgeon. These dos and don'ts include abstaining from alcohol and medicines not prescribed by the surgeon.
Post-operative care - You have to take certain precautions after the transplantation. For example, you must not expose the operated area to sunlight for some days. Shampoos and chemicals are also to be shunned. You may experience falling of displaced hair from the recipient zone. It is a perfectly normal phenomenon.
Hair transplant cost - The hair transplant cost depends mainly on the clinic and the surgeon's fees. The required number of grafts, that depends on the balding area size, also matters in this regard.
Hair transplantation is the most effective way to deal with pattern baldness. The process entails removal of the scalp's hair-bearing portion and transplanting it onto the bald patch. Recent technological advances have enhanced the convenience and affordability of the surgery, making it most popular method of medical hair restoration.
Follicular unit transplantation
A discussion offering basic hair transplant information is incomplete without a special discussion on follicular unit transplantation. This process is considered the most effective among the various hair restoration methods. The surgery involves transplanting hair from the permanent zone in the back of the scalp onto the affected areas.
The donor tissue is removed in one piece to ensure that the follicular units being relocated from the scalp back are not damaged. An integral part of follicular unit transplantation is single-strip harvesting. It ensures that no damage is caused to the individual hair follicles.
For those suffering from hair loss, they can choose from among three things: they could wear a wig, buy those new hair loss medications that are now available in the market, or, if they want clearer, faster and more direct results, undergo hair transplantation surgery.
But many questions bug those who are considering hair transplantation surgery. As hair transplantation procedures involve transferring hairs from the "donor area"�"mostly the back and side of the head�"to those thinning areas, many patients are worried that the donor areas may become scarred with the incisions that a hair transplant surgeon will have to make.
But here’s good news for prospective patients: an Australian doctor initially developed a relatively new technique, which practically avoids any incision in the donor area during the course of hair transplantation surgery. Instead of making incisions, individual follicles from the back and sides of the head could be painstakingly extracted with the use of a tiny circular-shaped punch, leaving no scar in the donor site in the process.
This technique is called follicular unit extraction. With FUE, there is no single incision made in the donor area. Instead, the donor area will be left with multiple tiny holes that only take about a week to heal.
Please visit the www.foundhair.com for more information about follicular unit extraction.
Dr. Jeffrey S. Epstein of the Foundation for Hair Restoration even developed his own version of this technique called follicular unit microextraction. Known by the acronym FUM, Dr. Epstein’s method allows hundreds of grafts to be harvested in a single procedure using 1.3 mm ultra-sharp punches. And all this are done without any kind of incision in the back of the head.
Upon extraction, each follicle is dissected free, under microscopic visualization, from the surrounding non-hair bearing skin, which then can be implanted in the donor site into tiny incisions.
Like other surgical procedures, however, direct follicular unit microextraction has its downsides and limitations. Those with curly hair or very fine hair, cannot be candidates for the procedure, since their hair type are at greater risk of damage, and therefore makes for poor growth of the follicles that were harvested.
Another downside to direct follicular unit microextraction is the much longer time required to perform the procedure. The maximum number of grafts that can be transplanted in a single three-hour procedure is about 400 to 500 follicular units only.
Most importantly, direct follicular unit microextraction is approximately three to four times more costly than the traditional microscopic follicular unit grafting.
These limitations notwithstanding, many patients of Dr. Epstein regularly undergo direct follicular unit microextraction, since with FUM, the healing of the donor site is much quicker and without sutures, while the transplants heal just as quickly as those of patients who opted for the more traditional follicular unit grafting.
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