Dr. Rassmann,

I apologize for the lengthy message, but I’m very concerned about my current situation and really need 3rd party insight.

The Situation:

Approximately 24 months ago, I had a transplantation procedure by a well known and highly respected expert in this field. Procedure deilvered over 3,300 FU’s to frontal 3rd in one session. The results at 12 months were incredible, as my hairline and overall density were more than I had hoped for. At about 18 months, I started noticing steady hair shedding, lasting for months. During this time, and up until today, I noticed structural changes to the transplanted hair (very thin in dia., squiggly, etc). Bottom line, at a little over 24 months I now have less than 50% of the density I had at 1 year with no improvement or regrowth. My diet is immaculate, very healthy, workout, take finasteride, minoxodil, etc. etc. In phone conversations with the doctor, he believes it’s Telogen Afluvium. However, this was not sudden loss all over my scalp that has been followed by growth. We’re talking about a steady loss of the transplanted hair, with nothing re growing, and the hair that’s remaining looking very ill.

Questions:

1. Are you aware of any similar cases like this?
2. If so, any insights on what causes it what to do to stop/generate re-growth?
3. Is it possible to consider this failed FU’s even though they looked great at 12 months?

Thank you for your time and insight.

Loss of ‘permanent’ hair from a previous hair transplant is very, very unusual. I would expect that the answer to your problem lies in your donor area now. If you lost 50% of the hair transplants, then you should have lost 50% of the hair population in the donor area. I have seen men develop Diffuse Unpatterned Alopecia after a hair transplant, though it is very rare. You need to have your scalp mapped out for miniaturization to make this diagnosis.