About 6.5 million men in the UK have experienced hereditary hair loss at some point. For some of them, a receding hairline is not a big deal and just a sign to stop buying shampoo and switch to clippers instead. However, for some others, even minor hair loss is a cause for major concerns. They might be concerned because they think that being bald night not suit them or just because they love their hair. However, whatever the reason is, hair loss is a scary prospect for millions of people. To make things even worse, hair loss is common among women as well, where more than 50% of them experience female-pattern hair loss when their age is 65 and above and requires different women’s hair loss treatment.
Searching for a hair loss remedy online also provides a variety of magical clinics and cures. However, it is hard to gauge the actual efficiency or the impact of those services. Therefore, to tackle any questions that you might have, Pharmica addressed all of your concerns below:
What Are the Causes of Hair Loss?
There are many various conditions, as well as lifestyle, variables that could be the cause of hair loss. However, it is well known that hereditary hair loss is the most common cause of baldness, which is a very common condition experienced by many individuals. This type of hair loss can be caused by a combination of various factors. For example, hereditary hair loss is primarily passed down from the affected person’s mother, although, some research suggests that it could be passed down from your father as well. Furthermore, hormones are also an essential variable in the hair loss equation. For example, dihydrotestosterone (or DHT) is an androgen that leads to thinning and reduction of the growth of your hair, where the more DHT you have, the more likely you are to start losing hair faster. Finally, your age is also a significant factor, where the majority of individuals tend to lose their hair as they get older.
However, hereditary reasons for hair loss are not the only factor that contributes to hair loss. One of the Alopecia (aka spot baldness), which an autoimmune disease that is caused by a breach in the immune privilege of the hair follicles. However, this condition tends to vary significantly depending on occasions, where some individuals only experience small bald spots while ofter completely lose their body hair. Even though some people can go into full remission, some others might not respond at all to treatment. However, this condition is rarer than pattern baldness, affecting only about one in 500 people in the UK.
Finally, there are many other factors and conditions that might lead to hair loss at some point in one’s life. Stress and emotional traumas can weaken hair growth while medical conditions like anemia or thyroid can contribute to hair loss. Conditions like these tend to be very diverse and therefore discussing the treatments with your GP before selecting your path to remission,
What Is Normal Hair Loss?
In reality, everyone loses hair every day. The majority of healthy individuals on average have between 80,000 and 120,000 hairs on the head while losing about 50-100 hairs in a day. However, this rate of hair loss is not a concern due to the fact that shedding is a part of the body’s natural renewal cycle.
What is Stress-Related Hair Loss?
In addition to mainstream causes of hair loss like using too many hair products or styling, hair loss can occur due to severe and constant stress, experiencing stressful events or even acute illnesses. Apart from Alopecia which can occur due to excessive stress, there are also two conditions that can also be related to stress – telogen effluvium which pushes large amounts of hair follicles into a resting phase, forcing them to fall out when washing or combing, and trichotillomania which creates an irresistible urge to scratch and pulls hair from your head.
What Can I Do to Stop Hair Loss?
Before treating hair loss, it is important to establish the cause of hair loss first. If you believe that hair loss is caused by stress, it is worth trying to address the roots and triggers of your stress. For example, trying to avoid those triggers while trying exercise or meditation as well as consulting with your GP might be a good way to address this condition. A similar approach can be adopted for hair loss caused by an underlying medical condition by treating that condition first.
However, stopping hereditary hair loss might be more difficult due to the fact that it appears regardless of your stress and illness conditions. However, if you believe that you have hereditary hair loss, don’t panic – there are many clinically proven men’s hair loss treatments available that can help stop it at its tracks.
What Treatments Can Help Hair Loss?
In order to achieve the most efficient hair treatment, it is recommended to use a combination of different treatments. The first one is minoxidil, a most widely-used treatment that is applied to a scalp twice a day in the affected area. Secondly, finasteride is also used, which involves taking prescription medication twice a day to suppress the hair loss hormones. Finally, to complete the treatment, caffeine-based shampoos are used to encourage hair growth.
What is Minoxidil?
Minoxidil is a male-pattern baldness treatment that is an antihypertensive vasodilator. The way it works is by improving the blood flow to your hair follicles, it increases the actual size of follicles as well as the hair shaft. As a result, it helps regrow hair thicker than it was previously thinning. This treatment is clinically proved to encourage the growth of hair as well as stopping hair loss for 9 out 10 men. Furthermore, more than 40% of men actually experience growth in some areas between 3 and 6 months after starting the treatment.
Minoxidil is a topical treatment that comes in a form of foam or solution that needs to be applied twice a day. Do not panic if at the start of the treatment you might experience more hair loss than before – this is a part of the treatment and happens due to dormant follicles being replaced by new ones. It is also worth noticing that even though minoxidil is generally well-tolerated by the majority of people, there could be some minor side effects like irritation or itching in some areas like the scalp or eyes. Also, some people might experience accelerated body hair growth that is linked to the consumption of the treatment.
What is Finasteride?
DHT hormone causes hair thinning while also slowing down growth. It is converted from testosterone b the 5-alpha reductase enzyme which is the cause of symptoms of pattern baldness. Therefore, finasteride treatment works by inhibiting that enzyme, preventing its conversion into DHT and, as a result, less DHT means less hair loss stimulation. Consequently, Finasteride is a clinically proven highly effective treatment, with 9 out 10 men either regrowing their hair or stopping the hair loss.
This treatment is taken orally once a day in a 1mg dose and needs to be taken continuously to ensure its effectiveness. Stopping taking the treatment could resume the pattern of baldness and cancel the progress.
Similar to minoxidil, the overwhelming majority of users won’t experience any side effects. However, some consumers might suffer from lower sex drive which, fortunately, usually appears in the early stages of the treatment.
What is the Best Shampoo?
It is important to know that only some shampoos are designed from scratch to help to prevent hair loss. These shampoos usually have a specific active element (e.g. caffeine) that stimulates and reinforces the weakened hair roots. To maximize the effectiveness of those shampoos, they should be used on a daily and left in the hair for a minimum of two minutes, ensuring that the maximum amount of caffeine is absorbed.
Even though the effects of caffeine shampoos are still being clinically reviewed, online reviews and generated worth of mouth create very positive feedback. A similar case is also relevant to side-effects- where only a very small proportion of users will experience minor side effects like itching and redness of the scalp.