Part 2 coming soon including Dr. Nigam’s scarless FUE (a new development) and future collaboration with Dr. Gerd Lindner.

Me: What made you move from the weight loss industry to the hair loss industry?  Seems like you had hair loss?

Dr. Nigam: It is a long story how I entered even obesity and metabolic disease management … I remain in a field till it excites me…I worked hard in the field of metabolic diseases and obesity…as a biochemist and physician…as there were not physicians in this field..only fitness trainers and dieticians… it is better to be a big man in a small town..rather than small man in a big town…. I could look into those problems from different perspective.  I looked at obesity from the perspective of hormones..lifestyle,biochemistry…metabolic syndrome…and indianised the low carb diets..apart from behavioral modification interventions.  Yes, I had hairloss from the age of 35.

Me: Is Dr. Mwamba still there (his second visit to India)?

Dr. Nigam: He left on the 24th of November.

Me: Any other surgeons or researchers from the west flying in?

Dr. Nigam: Cole said after Christmas he may…in December I will be going to Berlin to meet Gerd, and to Brussels to Dr. Mwamba’s clinic.

Me: How about Jahoda and Tsuji folks?

Dr. Nigam: It is better I visit their labs…rather than jahoda or tsuji comes to me..only difference is I have achieved certain success on human scalp as against tsujis work on and with mouse cells.

Me: I am also into health related issues that concern me and have several websites related to those issues.  I am a mini Dr. Nigam without labs or any biology background!

Dr. Nigam:  ya we are not traditional persons or docs.. I remember Henry Ford’s words… he was a visionary…and said that if he needed facts in engineering or finance or legal etc..all he used to do is talk to the best in his organisation and get the facts..not just the informatiuon..and his job was to apply the facts..he was only 5th or something pass..but he created the 6th cylinder in cars…not any engineer…I do the same..I want the solution for MPB…my guts said it lies in immediate present with fusion of hair restoration with biotech..and in the future with pure biotech science

I will post my interview with Dr. Nigam soon. If you have any intelligent questions to ask him besides accusations and mockery, please feel free to post them in the comments below (I can read the comments, even if I do not display them at present due to some spam software issues).

In 2013, Dr. Nigam from India became the most discussed person in the world hair loss industry when measured via internet forum mentions. Despite my skepticism about his current abilities and results, I am somewhat more optimistic about his potential for a breakthrough compared to the potential of most well known companies in the western world. Over the ten plus years that I have followed (on and off) developments in the hair loss industry, I have noticed that most companies in the developed world initially have fancy websites and powerpoint and video presentations, only to fold after raising substantial venture capital and other means of funding.

Reasons for failure range from lack of more funding, to tediousness of FDA approval, to lack of sufficiently better results compared to Propecia and Rogaine, and so on. Essentially, the scammers in the developed world are very professional and boring, while the scammers in the developing world are far more entertaining. If Dr. Nigam turns out to be a bust, at least he will be the most entertaining fraud among the 100s we have witnessed (when including miracle product vendors and fake hair transplant results’ exhibitors) in the last decade.

The main reasons for my moderate optimism about Dr. NIgam are:

1. His unparalleled enthusiasm, including: attending all sorts of conferences worldwide; communicating with virtually all experts in the hair multiplication and hair cloning sectors; participating in internet hair loss forums; giving interviews; no ego :-) etc…
2. His willingness to share and collaborate with the reputable Dr. Mwamba, and in all likelihood, other hair transplant surgeons in the near future per what he implied to me in his interview.
3. The fact that India has far less stringent medical regulations than the western world, enabling experimentation that would be deemed illegal in the west.
4. Dr. Nigam’s biotechnology background and seemingly impressive knowledge (per Dr. Cole, he “talks a good game”).
5. The availability of literally thousands of patients in India due to the country’s huge population and, in my opinion, higher rate of (cultural and genetic?) antipathy towards hair loss. Have any of you noticed the proliferation of hair transplant surgeons with a significant online presence in the country in recent years (e.g., Dr. Bhatti, Dr. Poswal, Dr. Radha and so many more)? Some moderately famous Indian actors have already been treated by Dr. Poswal, with photos on his website.

I hope that my interviewing Dr. Nigam does not play any part in your going or not going to him for treatment. I would not want to go to him until there is far more evidence about the safety and efficacy of these procedures (plus until I lose some more hair). But it is truly wonderful to see a different more enthusiastic, collaborative, rapid-results-oriented approach coming from the east. According to Dr. Nigam, some of the surgeons at the recent ISHRS Conference called him “the rebellious doctor”.

Update:

Dr. Nigam is attending the recent ISHRS 2013 meeting in San Francisco.  He gave an update on Hairsite, and it was quite interesting (some key quotes of his are below — ignore the bad grammar and punctuation).  Am looking forward to his next update after he talks with Dr. Jahoda.

Well arashi, you will be proved wrong..we will improve on these researchers finding…not just replicate ..
as we have a more holistic approach..a team based approach with feedback and work of different lab researchers from across the globe…with regulatory advantage .  My effort is to get researchers , who are working with different approaches for follicle neogenesis,to share and suggest,utilize each others advantage…

Spoke to washniek at ishrs.  They were culturing the epithelial and dermal components of the follicle separately and injecting them separately.  Neither they were culturing in 3d spheroids nor they were using growth factors specifically to activate dp/ds cells like shh,wnt .etc.

I got this clue about the freshly isolated dp or ds cells..and their trichogenic potential from jahoda… We have gone one step ahead…from jahoda ,
regards experimenting with fresh trichogenic dp/ds cells..by adding certain specific gf/shh, to activate or make ds/dp cells trichogenic…
can’t disclose much about it..but in our first test ..we can see thick terminal neofollicles on human scalp ,in 1sqcm area on the vertex of a patient in six weeks..

Jahoda used hanging drop method to culture in 3d..
we will shortly use polystyrene coated low adherent tubes for 3d aggregation..for mass production of 3d spheroids..so that we can inject the cells without dissociation.

We will use important gf to make the ds/dp cells more trichogenic.
Ans with the help of jahoda, gerd, many others and with our own insights…a good culture protocol will do the trick..to maintain the conductivity of dp/ds cells…

Dear james…i believe the creation of spheroidal dp or ds cell(and injecting as 3d spheroids and not dissociated cells,which we and jahoda are doing now)

with secretion of natural ecm…or a microfollicle created by gerd..is definitely the next thing to focus…. plus the use of freshly isolated trichogenic dp/ds cells with addition of gf or shh…to make dp/ds cells trichogenic and activated to be able to induce neofollicle formation….
plus the right culture protocol to induce these cells to produce hair ..
is not old news..not to be excited about.

Me and mwamba were approached by a lot of surgeons,regarding doubling and HM work..