hair_today
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Just yesterday I obtained and read the full-text of the recently published clinical trial results. (J Am Acad Dermatol. 2007 Nov;57(5):767-74.) It is shameful how misleading the promotional information for Rogaine foam is about its effectiveness.
People on these boards who are thinking of trying the foam in hopes of greater efficacy over the liquid should really read that paper. The results of the treatment were evaluated in two ways - one was by subjective self-assessment by the participants. That is where the oft-touted 70-something % success rate comes from. The other way is by objective measurements and photographic evaluation by trained researchers. Those measures told a different story. It turns out that participants were significantly biased in their self-evaluations and that even in the placebo group 40% of them judged a success even though the researchers found no such true effect. I suspect this bias was lessened in the liquid trials because its hard to say your hair improved when its been looking greasy everyday.
30-something % of the foam group regrew hair, as compared with 50-something % in liquid trials. Objective measures increase on average about 10% as opposed to significantly more (can't remember exactly) in liquid trials.
The discussion at the end of the paper stated that the foam is desirable because of its cosmetic superiority to the liquid, but explicitly acknowledged its inferior results. A pre-test also had shown that blood serum levels of minoxidil were half that of liquid users.
Of course, the foam certain did work to at least maintain for the vast majority of participants, and there is the curious fact that a previous study in stumptail macaques yielded better results than liquid! However, I thought this is a pertinent piece of information that appears to be widely unknown as of yet.
People on these boards who are thinking of trying the foam in hopes of greater efficacy over the liquid should really read that paper. The results of the treatment were evaluated in two ways - one was by subjective self-assessment by the participants. That is where the oft-touted 70-something % success rate comes from. The other way is by objective measurements and photographic evaluation by trained researchers. Those measures told a different story. It turns out that participants were significantly biased in their self-evaluations and that even in the placebo group 40% of them judged a success even though the researchers found no such true effect. I suspect this bias was lessened in the liquid trials because its hard to say your hair improved when its been looking greasy everyday.
30-something % of the foam group regrew hair, as compared with 50-something % in liquid trials. Objective measures increase on average about 10% as opposed to significantly more (can't remember exactly) in liquid trials.
The discussion at the end of the paper stated that the foam is desirable because of its cosmetic superiority to the liquid, but explicitly acknowledged its inferior results. A pre-test also had shown that blood serum levels of minoxidil were half that of liquid users.
Of course, the foam certain did work to at least maintain for the vast majority of participants, and there is the curious fact that a previous study in stumptail macaques yielded better results than liquid! However, I thought this is a pertinent piece of information that appears to be widely unknown as of yet.
unk:
