Hair Transplant Success rate: Do hair transplants really work?

What is the hair transplant success rate? Will any hair transplant surgeon give us a picture what result we will get as a final outcome of our transplant? Why do some people get fantastic results from hair transplant? Hair Growth Results after Nuleaf Hair Transplant and some get only average results? Hair transplant success rate depends on many factors: we will consider each factor one by one objectively.

Advancing Age will affect hair transplant success rate, but not always true.

When you are young, healing occurs rapidly , graft uptake is normal and survival of the planted follicle is maximum. The older you get, healing is delayed, graft survival is also low. Above age of 60 you can also develop diabetes and /or atherosclerosis, severely  diminishes graft survival. If you are a diabetic patient above 60 you probably are not a right candidate for hair transplant. On the other hand if you are 25-35 years old who does regular cardio exercise , then chances of success are maximum.

Thin Hairs in Donor zone or Lack of any donor zone

If you have thick hair (technically more than 70 microns) then you will require not only lesser number of grafts buy also will get a fuller denser look after the transplant. Thin hairs even in younger people are not very attractive for transplant. Sometimes a few young patients have thick beard hair than the hairs from back of the scalp. In these cases, in order to give a good fuller look we utilize the beard hair for hair transplantation.

In Larger Areas if low donor capacity will affect hair transplant success rate

A big recipient area will also require many grafts to cover which, unfortunately, is sometimes not possible. In grade VI baldness in order to cover the entire scalp, we have to reduce the density. A low density transplant will give you hair, but not very adequate hair. In these cases we concentrate on the frontal area and give the frontal area the maximum density so that at least a good hair line is formed.

Scars (From Past injury or Surgery like FUT) will hamper the hair transplant success rate by reducing hair graft survival

If scars of the previous surgeries are present, then extraction of the follicular units become difficult. Transaction rate also increases. Hence resultant graft yield is low. In such a cases we usually rely entirely on body hairs, mainly beard area, for obtaining follicular units.

Hair Transplants dont result in Magical Transformation! Unrealistic Expectation  will  reduce hair transplant success rate

Even with a high hair transplant success rate, some individuals still wont be too happy with their hair transplant. The reason being : unrealistic expectation. Patient wearing wigs/ hair pieces would expect the same level of density the wig/hair piece provides. However the appearance after a hair transplant may be significantly different than that wearing a wig/hair piece. So always confirm with the doctor the appearance that you will be getting after a hair transplant. Not discussing this with the patients results into dissatisfied patients even when growth of the hairs is near 100%.

Crown Area: Difficult Hair Transplant with High Graft Requirement.

Crown are or the vertex of the scalp is also termed as “Black hole” of hair transplant as the whatever number of grafts you put there is always some areas showing sparse hair growth. Crown is a circular area over the scalp. Here the androgenetic alopecia spreads in a circumferential pattern away from the centre of the scalp. If you put many grafts in the central portion of the crown at a very early stage then after 1-2 years, the peripheral area has lost hair again. Also hair grow in a whorled pattern in the crown area. Even in absence of the androgenetic alopecia, majority of peoples crowns area sparser in the centre. For these reasons, crown is the last priority area in an avarage case of hair transplantation. In a few rare cases where only crown is affected and nothing else, then we may cover the crown area with hair transplant.

You can read some of the success stories here: Hair Transplant Success Stories