Proscar 5mg Next Best Thing to 0.5mg dutasteride?

[doggfather]

I don't know if this should be in the Propecia forum, but I wanted to know if taking 5mg of finasteride every day is the next best thing to taking 0.5mg dutasteride every day since 5mg of finasteride almost lowers DHT to the same amount as 0.5mg dutasteride but I don't have to worry about the unknown long term effects of lowering type I DHT in the brain. I want to use something stronger since 20 months of 1mg propecia is not stopping my hairline from receding, but i'm a little hesitant to start taking dutasteride. Does anyone have any charts on the % of DHT lowered for both varying doses of dutasteride and finasteride as well?

 

[Sean68]

the next best thing would be dutasteride 3 x a week or eod. i think 5mg of finasteride
a day is just overkill. youre still only inhibiting one type of dht.

 

[Bryan]

I certainly don't have any exact data on this, but my wild guess is that to get something approaching a similar level of type 2 inhibition that you get with Avodart, you'd have to take something like 1 Proscar four times a day. Not all at once, but scattered evenly throughout the day. That might get reasonably close.

Bryan

 

[doggfather]

Well even if you take dutasteride 3x/week or eod you are still lowering type 1 DHT which is what I wanted to avoid although I still might give dutasteride 0.5mg a go if my situation gets worse. So in light of this do you think 5mg of finasteride is still overkill?
And dang Bryan, 1 Proscar 4x/day? You're talking about the 5mg one right? Wow 20mg of finasteride.
Wasn't the hair growth counts on 5mg Proscar the same as 0.1mg of dutasteride? So even if 5mg Proscar does not inhibit the same level of type 2 dht as 0.1mg or 0.5mg of dutasteride isn't it just as effective as 0.1mg of dutasteride and pretty close in effectiveness to 0.5mg of dutasteride?

Also, I know there was some study done on the effectiveness of finasteride that showed it was more effective on people with some certain variation of the 5alpha reductase (or something like that). Was there ever a study on whether or not dutasteride was effective on the people with the variation of the 5alpha reductase that finasteride was not effective on? Or any other similar kind of study that showed dutasteride being effective for non-responders of finasteride?

 

[H2O]

So in light of this do you think 5mg of finasteride is still overkill?

"Overkill" depends on what you're taking about. You're still only taling one pill a day. I would do some research into side effects of proscar at the 5mg dosage vs Avodart at the .1mg and .5mg dosages. My intuition tells me that the Proscar sides might come out a bit higher seeing as the Propecia 1mg and Avodart .5mg dosages compare fairly equally on percentage incidence of sides. I would look into this to find out the actual truth in percentages. I don't have this answer and this would be the overriding issue I would think as it seems to be the basis of your concerns. I don't believe cost would be hugely different between the two if generics were utilized.

And dang Bryan, 1 Proscar 4x/day? You're talking about the 5mg one right? Wow 20mg of finasteride.
Wasn't the hair growth counts on 5mg Proscar the same as 0.1mg of dutasteride?

Yes, in one study, as far as haircounts. And that is 5mg finasteride compared to .1mg dutasteride.....Bryan referred to Avodart and therefore dutasteride at the .5mg level when hazarding a guess at dosage efficacy equivalents.

So even if 5mg Proscar does not inhibit the same level of type 2 dht as 0.1mg or 0.5mg of dutasteride isn't it just as effective as 0.1mg of dutasteride...?

Perhaps as effective as .1mg of dutasteride as far as average measured haircount based on the one study. So perhaps 5mg Proscar=hair count of .1 mg dutasteride at the two year mark according to the one Phase II study completed by GSK.

...and pretty close in effectiveness to 0.5mg of dutasteride?

Not really....but it depends on what you call "close". Is 24 more hairs per square inch "close"?

From the Phase II trial results cunducted by GSK :

The graph below shows that after six month of treatment the hair counts measured in a 1 inch diameter circle increased by about ~96 hairs with 0.5mg Dutasteride, compared to about ~72 hairs with 5mg Finasteride. The hair counts increased significantly with an increase in dosage with the biggest gain being ~108 hairs with a dose of 2.5mg Dutasteride.

So compared to 5mg Finasteride (Propecia), .5 mg Dutasteride grew about 1.34 times as many hairs and 2.5 mg grew about 1.5 times as many hairs.

 

[Mens Rea]

NO NO NO AND NO.

5MG of finasteride a day would NOT be recommened. That sh*t is for your prostrate, youd risk big sides with no extra benefit from 1mg of Propecia.

 

[Bryan]

NO NO NO AND NO.

5MG of finasteride a day would NOT be recommened. That $#iT is for your prostrate, youd risk big sides with no extra benefit from 1mg of Propecia.

I'm going to fight until my dying breath this silly notion that there's going to be "big sides" just from using a few extra milligrams of finasteride!

Bryan

 

[Pondle]

NO NO NO AND NO.

5MG of finasteride a day would NOT be recommened. That $#iT is for your prostrate, youd risk big sides with no extra benefit from 1mg of Propecia.

I'm going to fight until my dying breath this silly notion that there's going to be "big sides" just from using a few extra milligrams of finasteride!

Bryan

According to that dose ranging study you posted, 5mg of finasteride doesn't inhibit much more DHT than 1mg.

 

[Bryan]

According to that dose ranging study you posted, 5mg of finasteride doesn't inhibit much more DHT than 1mg.

Exactly. Which is why it continues to amaze me that so many people are so bound and determined to believe that using more than 1 mg will greatly increase the risk of side-effects!

Bryan