Official 5yrs Merck Study

[socks]

Hairschmair,

Sorry you didnt find the post that useful! I will strive even harder to ensure the quality of my future posts meet your standards :wink:

Just kidding, silly!

I know it

So dutasteride rules lol!!!!!

Why would you say that?

 

[socks]

I think what it’s saying is that the when you start taking finasteride, the hairs shedding happens all at once, thus giving the impression that you are losing more hair, where as in a normal situation the hair is lost at different times. After a year or so of finasteride the hairs go back to there normal shedding phases. So in theory, when you do shed it won't be so noticeable. But I knew this already...

That may be true but I'm dont think that the paragraph I was referring was talking about the first few weeks.

To take a small quote from the paragraph:

"...peak efficacy was observed at one to two years of treatment with finasteride...This observation of an apparent peaking effect (I think they are referring to the 1 or 2 year mark) is likely due, in part, to the previously-reported beneficial effects of finasteride on the hair growth cycle based on a phototrichogram study...initiation of finasteride treatment was shown to increase the number of anagen-phase hairs and to increase the anagen to telogen ratio"


Basically, if you look at the following graph you'll see that when you start finasteride there is a rapid increase in hair counts:

Now, after the two year mark there is a ever decreasing hair count. What I'm suggesting is that during these first two years finasteride causes a increased anagen to telogen ratio that drives up the hair counts. Over time this synchronization "breaks" and hair counts decrease. This would *NOT* be an indication that finasteride isnt as effective but rather your hair's anagen to telogen cycle is reverting back to its "natural" cycle.


Another good possibility that can stand on its own or compliment my theory is a post made by Zwarflai on HLH. Here is his post in its entirety:

Well here is my explanation of why average haircounts drop after the first year on Propecia. It's important to note that these are average haircounts and therefor say nothing about individual response. First you must think about what makes the average haircount in a group go up or down, ie:

- people who gain hair increase haircounts.
- patients who maintain hair have no influence on haircounts.
- patients who lose hair decrease decrease haircounts

It follows from this that average haircounts increase when hairgain in the group is higher than hairloss. Average haircounts decrease when hairloss in the group is greater than hairgain. In the case of Finasteride we can say that hairgain was greater than hairloss in the first year, and smaller thereafter.

You have, for example, a hypothetical drug that gives 9 in 10 guys all their back in 12 months and after those 12 months they keep (or maintain in our hairloss jargon) that full head of hair for life. But in 1 guy it does nothing. In this case average haircounts will shoot up in the first year, because hairgain from those nine guys is much greater than the hairloss of the other 1. But once they have their full head of hair, there is no more hairgain. At this point the 1 non-responder will start to drag the average haircount down again.

Basically I'm saying that unless you have a product that minimally maintains hair for 100% of it's users, there will always be a time when hairloss outweighs hairgain and thus average haircounts decrease. I'm not saying Propecia works forever, but you can't tell from those trial results that it's effectiveness decreases either. The only way to find out is to take the drug and see how it works for you.


And oh yes, I believe the use of hairloss treatments will become more common in the future, as those treatments become more effective and widely known.

 

[powersam]

Principal exclusion criteria included significant abnormalities on screening physical examination or laboratory evaluation, surgical correction of scalp hair loss, topical minoxidil use within one-year, use of drugs with androgenic or antiandrogenic properties, use of finasteride or other 5alphaR inhibitors, or alopecia due to other causes. Men were instructed not to alter their hairstyle or dye their hair during the studies.

It'd be interesting to know what they mean by significant abnormalities.

The other exclusion criteria are pretty straight forward, but that one could mean anything really.