Category Archives: Brotzu Lotion

Brotzu Lotion, Fidia Farmaceutici

Brotzu Lotion Countdown Begins

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Update: April 15th 2018

— Dr. Brotzu’s video presenrtation about his Brotzu lotion is now embedded below. Keep in mind that this is not necessarily a summary from Fidia Farmaceutici itself. Hopefully, Fidia will update its website’s Brotzu lotion status later this year.

— The actual full presentation slides are available via the bellicapelli forums.

I first discussed the very interesting Brotzu lotion in early 2016. Since then, I have written several other posts in which I provided updates about the product, but all-in-all, there have been few major developments of note. Moreover, the product is supposedly not likely to benefit those who have lost most of their hair over five years ago. So its not a real cure for balding and hair loss, but nevertheless, a much needed potential alternative to existing hair loss medications Finasteride and Minoxidil.

The inventor of the product, Dr. Giovanni Brotzu, is now 83 years old. He is unlikely to make any further major breakthroughs at such an advanced age, although perhaps that is a moot point and the Brotzu lotion DGLA→PGE1 product is already as good as it can get for its particular chemistry.

Moreover, the patents for the Brotzu lotion and its potential future release are both in the hands of Fidia Farmaceutici (Italy) and not in the hands of the Brotzu family. The company last updated us in detail about the Brotzu lotion in January 2017 and concluded that:

We envisage the development of the potential product candidate being completed by 2018.

I am guessing that Fidia has its own researchers who are heavily involved with the product’s development, and Dr. Brotzu himself is now mostly an adviser.

Brotzu Lotion Status in 2018

Having said all that, the reason for this update is Dr. Giovanni Brotzu himself. Tomorrow, on April 14th, he is supposed to make an important presentation about his lotion at the Italian Society For Hair Science and Restoration’s annual conference. You can see a summary of this presentation on this page. When I translated the title, here is what came up:

Title of the Report: Liposomal solution containing DGLA, Equolo and Carnitene for the treatment of androgenetic alopecia.

If you live in Italy or are in the nearby vicinity, you can attend Dr. Brotzu’s lecture. More information after you scroll down in here. Questions will not be allowed.

  • There are a number of rumors online that the lotion could be released in the summer of 2018. I am skeptical that it can happen so fast, but that is probably why most people are so excited.
  • On Reddit Tressless, people have been going crazy about this since the beginning of this month. Eight of today’s top ten threads on there have the word “Brotzu” in their titles! Complete insanity.
  • Zero of the top ten threads on Reddit Tressless have the word “Aclaris” in their titles:-( See my next blog post from later today for more on that.
  • Also make sure to follow the original still growing Italian forum thread on this subject as well as the gigantic HLT forum thread on this subject.
Brotzu Lotion, Gail Naughton, Histogen, Ryoji Tsuboi, Shiseido

Positive News from Shiseido, Histogen and Dr. Brotzu

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As if the great news from Aclaris earlier this month wasn’t enough, out of the blue we get three new positive developments from totally separate entities during the past week.

Shiseido

Yesterday, this blog’s unpaid but respected Japanese correspondent “nosyu” provided us with a link to a big news story that Shiseido was commencing clinical trials in Japan in partnership with Tokyo Medical University and Toho University. Seems like the trial will entail 60 men and women and go on for up to 3 years. Another new article estimates the cost of treatment to be around $900.

Shiseido’s technology is probably identical to what the original inventor Replicel is/was doing in terms of autologous cell culturing and transplantation using the permanent hair at the back of a balding person’s scalp. Perhaps Shiseido might have its own improvements to the Replicel process, but that is hard to tell at the moment. It seems like one set of injections will give lifelong results!

Note that Dr. Ryoji Tsuboi of Tokyo Medical University (who will lead the clinical research work there), is also co-president of next year’s 10th World Congress for Hair Research. So Shiseido is hiring very reputable people. This development is especially good news since Replicel’s stock price and previously strong social media responsiveness have both tanked in recent months (perhaps this newly published video with Replicel CEO Lee Buckler was not filmed too long ago and Replicel is still continuing work in the hair department). Thankfully, Shiseido (the world’s fifth largest cosmetics company) is not letting us down.  Also see my post from 2014 on Japan’s new laws fast-tracking stem cell treatments.

Histogen

To my utmost surprise, Histogen’s CEO Dr. Gail Naughton responded to some questions from HLT forum member “Tomtom21”. Over the years, I have become disenchanted with this company (despite my regular coverage of it on this blog) since it seems to have been in the news for at least ten years. Numerous presentations, successful funding rounds and much media attention have still not led anywhere insofar as treatment being made available anytime soon to the general public. Nevertheless, it is refreshing to see the CEO responding to people in person. I always found Ms. Naughton to be fairly genuine and sincere and hope that her company does end up like this.

Getting back to the subject matter of this news item, Dr. Naughton states that Histogen’s HSC treatment will be made available in Mexico first in 2018 (!) and they will soon be conducting a large-scale 330-person clinical trial in Mexico with a local partner. They are also close to getting a partner in China for what I assume will be human trials in that country. The company is also planning for Phase I trials in women and Phase II trials in men in the US soon. Dr. Naughton said that higher doses are more effective per Dr. Craig Ziering’s findings. Finally, the company will most likely get more funding from an Asian partner, and will also prepare for an initial public offering (IPO) thereafter.

Brotzu Lotion

While all these new-age companies with their sizable funding rounds look into cellular biology, 81-year old Dr. Giovanni Brotzu is old school and prefers a topical product. I never wanted to cover this man’s work in the first place, but here I am mentioning him for a second time this year. Last week Dr. Brotzu gave a detailed interview to an Italian hair loss forum team. The big news is that there is an ongoing trial using his Brotzu lotion on 60 androgenetic alopecia patients. Virtually everything he says sounds reasonable to me, although I have done very little research on the accuracy of some of the more esoteric things that he mentions that I do not understand. He does make some excuses about the lack of photos.

Someone more motivated than myself can check out the Italian forum threads on this man and see if people over there are also optimistic. I like the fact that Dr. Brotzu openly and honestly states that his product will not help regain long-lost hair. Most likely, the best case scenario is that you will only regain what you lost in the past five years. Still a great potential solution for many younger people. Dr. Brotzu has a few patents to his name (the details for some of which include information on hair growth related applications).