ISHRS

ISHRS 21st Annual Meeting in San Francisco

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ISHRS -- International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery.
ISHRS — International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery.

ISHRS 21st Annual Meeting in San Francisco

The International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery (ISHRS) is having its 21st annual meeting in San Francisco from October 23-27, 2013. Unlike some hair transplant and hair loss related associations that are operated by hair loss forum owners, the ISHRS has no connection with any private forum.

In my mind, this makes it the best association out there, albeit a bit large with almost 1,000 members. Their annual conferences have become superb in recent years, and I would probably go to this one if I was allowed entry.

The summary of this 21st meeting is excellently presented in the below page:

ISHRS 21st Annual Meeting Daily Review

In order of what interests me the most from the 100 plus scheduled presentations and workshops:

  1. I am especially interested in the 30-minute presentation on hair follicle cloning and regeneration by Dr. Colin Jahoda. Of particular noteworthiness to me, Dr. Nigam is a huge fan of Dr. Jahoda. It seems like out of all the hair loss researchers in the world, Dr. Nigam respects Dr. Jahoda the most.
  2. A 30-minute presentation on Extra-follicular Environmental Modulation of Hair Regeneration by Dr. Cheng-Ming Chuong (with moderation by the famous Ken Washenik).
  3. Dr. Jerry Cooley’s 12-minute presentation titled “Bioenhancements of Hair Transplantation”.
  4. Dr. Carlos Wesley’s 20-minute presentation on scarless follicle harvesting, which is presented as part of a section called “Beyond FUT and FUE”.
  5. “Is Low Level Laser Therapy Effective in Treating Androgenetic Alopecia? A Review of 5 Years Experience in Treating Hundreds of Patients with Male and Female Pattern
    Hair Loss” — 10-minute presentation by Dr. Shelly Friedman
  6. A 10-minute presentation by Dr. Nilofer Farjo summarizing highlights from the 7th World Congress for Hair Research.
  7. Dr. Wayne Hellstrom’s presentation title (“Post Finasteride Syndrome Update: Urologist’s Perspective”) is a bit scary to me, since I still take 5mg Proscar quarter tabs once every 2 days.  Hopefully, any side effects he has seen are largely in those who take higher doses.
  8. Dr. Christian Bisanga has an interesting 7-minute presentation on miniaturization in the donor area. For years, I have been skeptical about hair transplant surgeons’ claims that a hair restoration procedure is permanent. Meaning that any hair moved from the donor area at the back to the front of the scalp will remain permanent. I think this is a lie. Most severely balding people I see also have some thinning in the donor area, and many older people have absolutely no hair in the donor area. My grandfather was one such case, and I have been heading in that direction for a few years now. My donor hair and side of scalp/above-ear hair are clearly thinning. Donor hair is often not permanent, but admitting that can hurt a surgeon’s customer base significantly.

The majority of the presentations and workshops are quite interesting, but largely focus on hair transplantation techniques. FUE is becoming especially important based on the number of presentations covering that method. Dr. Robert True, in his introduction, states that “FUE has emerged, and in the minds of many, will soon replace FUT as the hair transplant procedure of choice.” Hard to believe that 10 or so years ago, almost no-one was doing FUE.

Propecia, Finasteride, Minoxidil, Rogaine

Do Finasteride and Minoxidil work at Regrowing Hair?

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On this blog, I have purposely limited discussion about the only two FDA approved existing medications (Finasteride and Minoxidil) for treating hair loss. I consider those treatments to be subpar in the modern world considering the tremendous progress that has been made in science and technology over the past several decades.

Note that Dutasteride has been approved to treat hair loss in Japan and South Korea. It is more effective than Finasteride.

Although this post may seem anti-hair-loss-medication thus far, it is also important for readers to take a look at the best case scenarios. For that, I leave you with a collection of before and after patient photos showing hair growth success with Finasteride and/or Minoxidil.

Do Finasteride (Propecia) and Minoxidil (Rogaine) work well to Grow Hair?

The problems with Finasteride (brand name Propecia from Merck, now Organon) and Minoxidil (brand name Rogaine from Johnson & Johnson) can be summed up as follows:

  1. Neither of the two medications work on everyone.
  2. Even when they work, they tend to rarely ever grow lengthy robust hair strands. And they almost never grow decent quality hair on totally bald regions of the scalp.
  3. They can both cause side effects, with Finasteride being the more dangerous of the two in that regard.
  4. It seems that for most people, the medications stop working after a number of years.
  5. You have to keep buying and using these medications permanently, or else any gains go away. Besides the significant expense involved, this is a nuisance since you have to regularly replenish supplies. If you travel away from home, you have to remember to take an appropriate quantity of these medications with you.
  6. In the case of Finasteride you need a doctor’s prescription, which is yet one more expense and hassle. I used to get my prescription from a hair transplant doctor. The last time I had to renew it, he charged me $50 for the visit plus wasted one hour of my time trying to convince me to get a small hair transplant. Luckily, I only take one pill every two days, and won’t need another prescription for a while.

Moreover, even I have seen some success in hair growth with Finasteride and Minoxidil. This despite only taking a quarter tab of 5mg Finasteride (Proscar) every two days, and not using Minoxidil every day as recommended.

However, I think that these medications are only giving me some short hair and an appearance of coverage in certain lighting. Overall, almost none of my hair can grow more than 2 inches anymore, and I am sure neither of these two medications will give me back most of the hair that I have already lost for more than a few years.