@IdealForehead did a google. Turns out there are numerous clinics that do regen around my city
Well oops Georgie better start over.
I read and calculated all the results backwards. Sorry.
It was Activated
Arthrex that did really incredibly well (and it was actually a 56% increase in density), not Regen. Regen did poorly. I've reviewed the article again to get it straight and I'll break this up in sections to summarize. Hope this helps.
PRP Comparison Study
The comparison study was done of plain CPunT brand PRP (18 patients), calcium activated Regen brand PRP (3 patients), and calcium activated Arthrex brand PRP (3 patients).
Activated PRP results table is attached for reference. To summarize, the total study outcome was:
- Plain CPunT PRP (18 patients, Result:
31% increase in density after 12 weeks with 3 monthly treatments)
- Activated Arthrex PRP (3 patients, Result:
56% increase in density after 6 months with one treatment)
- Activated Regen PRP (3 patients, Result:
23% decrease in density after 6 months with one treatment)
All the patients were men in their roughly 30s and 40s with NW3 hairlines to start.
So it was activated Arthrex (not Regen) that had the best results. The biggest problem with this though is there were only 3 patients in each activated PRP trial arm, so a large part of this variation might just be random chance (eg. if they had high responders in the Arthrex trial).
Nonetheless, the Arthrex result is incredible. Even high responders to other usual therapies do not get these kinds of results from a single treatment. I've definitely never seen anything else like a 56% increase reported elsewhere. And everyone in the entire study did very well except those three guys in the Regen arm. Either there was something wrong with Regen, or those guys were just the only three nonresponders in the whole trial.
The Principle of Calcium Activation
The idea of "calcium activation" is that a lot of the growth factors involved in making PRP work are ones that are released directly from the platelets themselves. But if you just reinject platelets naturally without pre-activation, they won't necessarily do anything, and may just stay inactive (same as they were when floating in the blood). (
from this thread)
By exposing them to calcium first, it triggers them to activate as if they are trying to make a clot, which makes them release all their growth factors, and this makes the therapy much more effective.
The researchers from the PRP comparison study quote several other prior studies that demonstrated also that calcium activation gives better results for hair with PRP. PRP can be calcium activated in different ways (eg. calcium gluconate, calcium chloride) but these do not appear to be all the same. (
eg. this thread of researchers/scientists talking about their different preferred means to "calcium activate" their PRP formulations)
Arthrex Protocol for Calcium Activation
The Activated Arthrex PRP process from the study quoted with the 56% gain at 6 months from a single injection was as follows:
(Note: "A-PRP" = autologous PRP = standard PRP solution)
1) The Arthrex Angel system was used to prepare A-PRP (3 mL) from 120 mL of whole blood when the instrument hematocrit level was set to 2%.
2) The A-PRP was then combined with 5 mL of platelet poor plasma to produce 8 mL of A-PRP with a five-fold increase in platelet concentration over whole blood.
3) A-PRP was then activated through the addition of 10% (
v/
v) calcium gluconate, which was immediately injected into the treatment zone through a 1 mL Luer lock syringe equipped with a 25-gauge needle.
4) Multiple 4 cm2 sections (2 cm × 2 cm squares) of frontal scalp constituted the treatment zone, and each received 1 mL of AA-PRP.
Assessment
There are multiple studies that suggest calcium activated PRP is better than non-activated PRP. I think it would be hard to state with absolute certainty that Activated Arthrex is the best method for PRP for hair though, given that as I said, only 3 patients went through this trial arm.
Perhaps the most reasonable assessment for the difference between the Arthrex vs. Regen results is that it was just random chance the Arthrex trial got the 3 high responders and the Regen trial got the 3 low responders. If these two treatments were in fact identical, and the difference was random chance, then the average result for all 6 guys would have been a
16.5% density increase by 6 months from a single session of activated PRP. But even this would still be a phenomenal result.
So if anyone's ever going to be going for PRP, calcium gluconate activated PRP seems to be the best approach. And to be on the safe side, you would probably want to go with Arthrex. You could inquire to make sure the clinic can do calcium gluconate activated Arthrex and then show them the activation protocol to ensure they follow it.
Again, not sure how available Arthrex is or how many places readily do calcium gluconate activation. But this is what the study says. (Correctly now.)