Hair Loss Cure 2020

Update: December 1, 2020 — Histogen just announced preliminary week 18 results for its HST-001 Phase 1b/2a clinical trials.

Good news: Patients treated with HST-001 grew new hairs in the vertex region of the scalp.
Bad news: HST-001 did not achieve statistical significance at the week 18 primary endpoint assessment.

Note that the trial is not over yet. We now await week 26 results in two months time.

Update: October 5, 2020 — Histogen completes final dosing in its 1b/2a trial for androgenic alopecia in men.

Update: June 23, 2020 — New update on Histogen study from Emily (see bottom half of this post for more):

“As of this morning, we are half way enrolled. The last day to screen for the study will be July 10th. If anyone is interested, they should call me this week and I will get them scheduled.”

June 16, 2020

Histogen History

I first covered San Diego based Histogen (stock ticker HSTO) in 2014. At the time, there was a lot excitement about the company’s Hair Stimulating Complex (HSC) product HST 001. It is supposed to be more effective than Finasteride or Minoxidil in treating male pattern baldness. Histogen’s Linkedin page currently shows them with 28 employees and 584 followers.

This HST 001 product is an injectable that contains key growth factors which benefit hair growth. These include KGF, VEGF, and follistatin, all of which positively impact hair follicle stem cell proliferation. The growth factors are produced by hypoxia-induced conditions.

Failure

Between 2014 and 2018, Histogen made steady progress. In 2018, when I last wrote about the company, they were set to start Phase 3 clinical trials in Mexico. The excitement in the hair loss world was palpable. Histogen was also starting trials for its women’s hair loss product HSC660.

Most people assumed that Histogen’s HSC would be available by 2020. Unfortunately, something went wrong and the company never managed to complete those final Phase 3 trails.

Histogen Hair Stimulating Complex Round Two

Instead, in 2019, Histogen went “back to the future” on us. They announced that they were starting Phase 1b trials! This major regression on the part of Histogen was shocking. And when combined with the demise of Aclaris Therapeutics’ JAK inhibitor trials for androgenetic alopecia, 2019 ended up being disappointing. The one positive was that at least Histogen did not disband or go bankrupt.

Histogen HST 001 — Histogen Hair Stimulating Complex (HST 001) Trials.

However, Histogen is now back on track again and has received FDA approval to proceed with trials in 2020. Moreover, the company merged with Conatus Pharmaceuticals in 2019 and made Richard Pascoe the new CEO.

Histogen CEO Richard Pascoe’s 2019 Presentation

Dr. Pascoe made the following interesting presentation in 2019:

I was still not planning to write any post covering the company this year. My goal was to only write about Histogen again if they announced completion of Phase 2 trials. I did not want to go on yet another wild goose chase.

However, I was forced to alter my decision because of the below e-mail that I received out of the blue today. I am surprised that they mention Histogen in the e-mail and do not keep the company name private.

Patient Recruitment for HST 001

Hello Page Admin of Hair Loss Cure 2020,

I am the Manager of Recruitment at California Dermatology and Clinical Research Institute. We are a research site in Encinitas, California focused on dermatology specific clinical research studies.

We just opened enrollment for a male pattern hair loss study testing a new investigational treatment. The sponsor is the San Diego based drug manufacturer, Histogen. Here is a bit more information on the development of this drug so far: June 1 Announcement.

We are looking for participants ages 25 – 55 who are grades 3 vertex, 4 or 5 on the Norwood Hamilton scale and are not currently using finasteride or minoxidil. This study will take place over a 26 week period and has 7 visits to our office in Encinitas. Compensation may be provided to those who qualify and enroll.

If you think any of your viewers would be interested in participating, I would really appreciate you sharing our information!

Anyone who would like to see if they may qualify can reach me at (760) 203-3836. If anyone is interested, they should contact me at their earliest convenience, as the study hopes to fill enrollment within the next month.
—
Emily Baker
Manager of Recruitment and Digital Presence
California Dermatology & Clinical Research Institute
561 Saxony Place Suite 102, Encinitas, CA 92024
P (760) 203-3839 x102 | F (760) 203-3840 |
www.cdcrinstitute.com

It is encouraging that they are testing HST 001 on men with extensive baldness only.

Please contact this company only if you satisfy all the requirements mentioned in the e-mail. You have to travel to Encinitas (San Diego), California seven times in six months. So I am guessing that you do not want to contact them if you do not live nearby.

Dr. Gail Naughton Presentation

Histogen CEO Dr. Gail Naughton’s 2013 presentation can be seen here. In there, it is mentioned that the company’s Hair Stimulating Complex was already in Phase 2 trials :-( Dr. Naughton seems to have a stellar reputation in the biotech and regenerative medicine world. Update: Also see Dr. Steven Chang’s 2018 presentation.

New Hair Loss Chat

September 20, 2020

Recently, one of this blog’s readers encouraged me to create a hair loss chat on Discord. After a day of hesitation, I started the chat last week. So far, it has been going great (expand screenshot above) with no spam. I initially only invited people who emailed me useful intelligent information at least a few times over the years.

I now want to invite other serious people so that we can get at least 50-100 regular participants. If you are interested in joining, please post a comment in this post under your existing username and, if possible, legitimate email address. Thereafter, email me using the same email address and let me know your blog username and why you want to join the chat. Also your city/state/country location. If you do not post comments on here but have a solid posting history on any of the hair loss forums out there, let me know too for verification purposes. If all seems ok and I feel like you will not spam the chat, I will send you an invite link. My e-mail can be found in the contact us page. Make sure to check your spam folder for my reply in case it goes there.

Initial preference will be given to those who have made mostly useful comments on this blog in the past. These do not have to be scientific comments. As long as you have been courteous, I am okay with your participating in the new chat.

For the most part, this chat will help people looking to compare their existing hair loss treatment regimens with others and make improvements. Including by using newer products, delivery mechanisms and alternative or esoteric ingredients. I hope to benefit from this information too.

I would not recommend joining the chat just to always vent. Nor just to always complain about delays in future hair cloning and hair multiplication related prospects and trials. Some venting and complaining will be acceptable.

The moderation in the hair loss chat will be very strict. If anyone posts dozens of emotional comments in a day with nothing useful to say, they may get banned. It is unfair to have intelligent comments move out of the screen view due to one person posting lots of garbage daily and monopolizing the chat window.

If anyone looks like they are there as a hair transplant surgeon representative or are primarily there to promote specific products, they will be banned. If anyone keeps repeating that there will never be a hair loss cure, they will likely get banned. Any excessive cursing or insulting of other chat participants (or even doctors and surgeons) will be grounds for being booted. Any excessive political or religious discussions will also be frowned upon.

I am sure that 100 percent scientific and technical discussions can get dull and dissuade those who are not interested in chemistry and biology. So I will give some leeway for off-topic comments. At least in the general chat channel.

In all likelihood, if we reach over 50 participants, I will hand over moderating duties to a regular chat participant. I will rarely have more than a few hours a week of time to devote to the chat.

Channels

In chats on Discord, you can break things into channels to separate key subjects of interest. Among the hair loss related subjects that most interest me at present include:

The related subjects of At-Home Microneedling, Dermarolling, Wounding and Follica. I may start microneedling myself if motivated enough by success stories.

Oral Dutasteride for hair loss reviews. Also mesotherapy and Dutasteride.

Topical Finasteride. Especially Polichem’s P-3074.

Oral Minoxidil.

Dr. Takashi Tsuji and Riken.

Exosomes.

Breezula.

Please do not be disappointed if you are not invited immediately. I want to be selective initially and see how it goes. I do not want to waste my time again by accepting spammers, trolls and overly negative people.

October 31, 2014 — Hair Loss Chat

I recently installed chat functionality on this site. See hair loss chat for more details. I initially allowed anyone to post, but due to spam, you now have to register. If popular, I might pay to get a better chat on the site in the future. The current one is based on a free plug-in.

Also, if people are keen, I can arrange a once a week fixed chat time when many people show up at the same time. I cannot promise to be there each week. Please post recommendations on the time and day when you prefer to chat under the comments to this post. Try to post Eastern US time preferences to keep things easy for me. I am located in the Pacific zone.

Hair loss cure news blog. Hair cloning and hair multiplication developments for baldness.

Histogen Phase 1B/2A Trials for HST 001