Hair surgery or hair transplantation:

Hair surgery or hair transplantation is a technique in which an organ is transferred (a small reminder: the hair is a living organ) into the scalp. When using hair surgery, it is important to ensure that all the parts of the hair (the bulb, the bulge and the sebaceous gland) remain intact or undammaged.

 

What is done during this surgery?

Surgeons take hair from where it still exists ( the Donor área) and redistribute it to where it no longer exists. (This place is called the recipient área)..
In order for a person to realize that they are losing their hair, they must have lost more than 50%. Even after losing 55% of the hair, the eye can never tell the difference between the two areas (the areas with 100% hairs and the one with less hairs). So, if an area without hairs manages to fill up to 50%, it gives
the impression that there has never been hairloss. Thus the basis of hair surgery is a redistribution of the follicles in order to try to reach 50 to 60% of the
original hair density so that the eye has the impression that the hair is still full.

There are different techniques of hair surgery.

1. The Follicular Unit Transplantation (FUT) technique consists of Harvesting a strip of scalp tissue with a scalpel or knife , closing the wound with stiches , dissecting the follicles outside the body under microscope and placing the grafts back into the recipient área of the patient. FUT is an invasive surgical technique. Indeed, it leaves a 1 to 2 mm scar on the back of the patient’s head. However, due to the elasticity of the skin that depends from one person to another, this scar may widen from 1 to 2 cm and thus becomes difficult to hide.

2. Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE) technique is the least invasive nowadays and consists of extracting individually the follicles with a micro punch under high magnification loupes.The harvested well trimmed follicles is directly implanted
to the recipient área with no extra manipulation . Although any cut in the body generates a scar, with the FUE, the healing process is quick and the scar remains almost invisible to the naked eye.

What to do after surgery?

Regarding the FUT: you will have 6 months during which you will not practice any sport, at the risk of enlarging the scar.
Concerning the FUE: In the donor area, this problem does not exist because the wounds close in a week.

You will be able to practice any activity. However, in the recipient area, as in FUT, you will have 6 months of precautions to take before the hair grows
When you remove the hair, it is disconnected from the blood vessel. The brain, which realizes this situation, will order the hair to go into the telogen phase, leading to graft shedding. The telogen phase lenght is 3 to 6 months ; therefore you have to wait that time to see the new hair graft growing .

The FUE is the technique with the most weight because 70 to 80% of clinics in the world practice this method.

There are different types of FUE:

FUE Shaven: During this procedure, the surgeon shaves the whole head. With the help of a punch mounted on a handle (manual or motorized), all follicles are removed from the donor área and placed. On the recipient área with fórceps or implanters.

FUE Unshaven: During this action, the surgeon will only cut or trim the hair that will be removed and placed in the recipient área .While this practice is longer and more expensive, it remains possible and feasible without limits. As this method cost a lot of money, we offer you less expensive , intermediate solutions:
The Back shaven method : During this procedure, the surgeon will only shave the donor área.The patients can quickly recover their initial appearance within one month post op.

FUE Patchy shaven : the surgeon makes sure to shave the scalp in small strips in order to cover them with the remaining existing hairs .This technique limits the size of your procedure.

How long does a FUE surgery last?

For 1000 grafts , a team composed of one doctor and 2 technicians will complete the surgery within 8 hours from start to end.
However, since the needs can vary from 1,000 to 4,000 or even 5,000 grafts , the FUE can be done in several consecutive days. We then ensure that we have a good strategy so that the patient can get comfortable ,eliminate anesthetics and does not get intoxicated. Always performed locally, anesthesia can
be done box by box in order to allow the patient to make this large number of grtafts over several days.

 

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