Why Not Get A Hair Transplant Instead?

[Noah]

Occasionally on this forum, when we are talking about hair systems, some new poster will pop up to say "why don't you just get a hair transplant instead?". They make it sound like we might temporarily have forgotten that such a panacea is available, or be too tight-fisted to spend the money. I saw this comment on YouTube (credit to poster "Dan the Man") which I think explains my view on transplants better than I could have:

"The most grafts per square centimeter a transplant has ever achieved was 70-80 and at that rate, only 75% survive because of blood restrictions. In a safe transplant, meaning more than 85-90% graft survival, 40 grafts per square centimeter is the max. The average person has 100 follicles which contain 2 or more hairs per square centimeter except at the hairline where it is a little less dense and each follicle only has 1 hair per follicle. In other words, the best you can get is 2/3 natural density and this would exhaust your entire donor area just to fill up receded temples. All of the advertised transplant results are on patients with receded temples, not a bald spot on the crown or slick bald up top. Even then, the temples are given around 4000 grafts and they still aren't as dense as the rest of the patient's healthy hair. The average bald man will only be able to spare 6-7000 grafts in his life, so just to fill up a few square inches of space would exhaust your supply totally and then you'd be totally out of options a few years down the line. Some men's hair around the back and sides begin to thin in their 60's and definitely by their 70's so your scars would reveal themselves and your transplanted hair would thin as well.

The only transplant anyone should consider is a temporal peak transplant which would only be about 250-500 grafts per side depending on how pronounced you would want them to be. This would make a system look more natural and avoid the classic wide forehead look that far too many wearers have been dealing with for decades." (I have edited the original very slightly, but w/o changing the sense).

 

[ManinBlack]

Yeah I agree totally. It's better to just shave it off and then glue a hairpiece to your head rather than spending thousands of dollars and getting your scalp cut up just so you can have some bum fluff on top of your head that is never thick enough. I will probably get a temple point transplant tho since my temples are almost totally gone. Are there any hair systems that can cover the temples btw?

 

[ariel12160]

You soooo right about the temporal peak issue !!
Im always think about it and say to myself that if one day I would decide to wear system , it will be after a temporal peak transplanet , something that make the system realistic

 

[Kebawo]

Not to mention a lot of people aren't able to get a transplant due to how bad the thinning has become, I'm NW6/7 and have no hope for a transplant.

 

[hanginginthewire]

I think you can’t really discount transplants across the board. A lot depends on your hair characteristics and your donor.

 

[Noah]

I wouldn't disagree with that, but I do think the publicity surrounding hair transplants is often misleading, and guys end up heading down that route without realising the limitations of what they are buying into. People are aware of the risks of shock loss and the transplants not taking at all, whereas the more significant issue is that, even if everything goes well, the result for a full scalp transplant is commonly thin and disappointing.

It stands to reason that if your donor area is, what, two-and-a-half square inches of normally-spaced hairs, then you are going to get two-and-a-half square inches worth of coverage at normal density when you relocate the hairs (actually a bit less, because there is always some wastage). And you are spreading the same hair over 5 square inches you're only going to get 50% of the density, and so forth. There is no escape from that arithmetic. But that's not the impression you get from the 'before and after' photos. Carefully lit, with helpful shadows filling in the gaps, it looks like the two-and-a-half square inches worth of hairs magically blossomed into a whole scalpful. And at some level I think lots of guys go into the transplant process believing in that magic, and the reality is a disappointment.

 

[ManinBlack]

I wouldn't disagree with that, but I do think the publicity surrounding hair transplants is often misleading, and guys end up heading down that route without realising the limitations of what they are buying into. People are aware of the risks of shock loss and the transplants not taking at all, whereas the more significant issue is that, even if everything goes well, the result for a full scalp transplant is commonly thin and disappointing.

It stands to reason that if your donor area is, what, two-and-a-half square inches of normally-spaced hairs, then you are going to get two-and-a-half square inches worth of coverage at normal density when you relocate the hairs (actually a bit less, because there is always some wastage). And you are spreading the same hair over 5 square inches you're only going to get 50% of the density, and so forth. There is no escape from that arithmetic. But that's not the impression you get from the 'before and after' photos. Carefully lit, with helpful shadows filling in the gaps, it looks like the two-and-a-half square inches worth of hairs magically blossomed into a whole scalpful. And at some level I think lots of guys go into the transplant process believing in that magic, and the reality is a disappointment.

Well sometimes, especially with FUE they take hair from outside that "safe" donor area to supplement a large transplant but of course you may lose that hair in the future if you were meant to.

 

[Noah]

That seems to be an issue even with the 'safe' donor hair. The official line is that it is DHT resistant, but several guys have told me that over the medium term it does in fact shed.

 

[Heinrich Harrer]

In simple text: transplant is a mediocre truth, hair system is a great lie.

- Heinrich

 

[Fanjeera]

I am as well planning temple point transplant. But why not a few cm-s of hairline as well to place to hairpiece behind a transplanted hairline to hide the hairpiece even more? Hairline is the most difficult part to keep looking natural with hair systems.

What about transplanting body hair? Could body hair be added diffusely to thinning sides and nape to thicken them up? Is it even possible to transplant between existing hair or does the area need to be bald? Will transplanting kill the growing hair?

 

[deg_dilemma]

My best friend and I, we have known each other almost 30 years. He just had a hair transplant and I just got my first system. We diverged on the fact that I knew my donor area was poor (max 2500 grafts) and I knew I would still have a bald crown after a hair transplant, whereas he had a better donor area and was OK with being a bit bald on the crown. But he's not a research kinda guy, so I know he will not get the output he expects from a hair transplant. But so be it - he didn't want to wear a "wig" anyway.

Fanjeera - someone I know used beard hair (and possibly bumfluff for all I know) to supplement his sparse donor area. Not many places do body hair hair transplant but he went to somewhere in India. He looked like a proper train wreck for a week and then a partial train wreck for a few more weeks. But I have to admit he looks pretty decent now.... of course not like a hair system but he looks quite natural for his age.

 

[Heinrich Harrer]

I am as well planning temple point transplant. But why not a few cm-s of hairline as well to place to hairpiece behind a transplanted hairline to hide the hairpiece even more? Hairline is the most difficult part to keep looking natural with hair systems.

What about transplanting body hair? Could body hair be added diffusely to thinning sides and nape to thicken them up? Is it even possible to transplant between existing hair or does the area need to be bald? Will transplanting kill the growing hair?

As long as the system angles are fine and you don’t lower it too much, it will be just fine. It should also be thinned out, like when they make a thick hairline less thick, I don’t know the word. That is very important, most people don’t do that and end up looking ridiculous. Your goal isn’t to stuff your head with hair, it’s to fool everyone. Then with a proper haircut, alignment and color, you will look fantastic. I actually think that if I ever put a hair piece on again I’d dye it gold/white and the rest of my hair too. I’d be a proper playboy but kinda gay. I don’t mind because then women go “is he? Is he not?”, it drives them mad. Damn if only hair pieces weren’t so sh*t... I miss them.

 

[Xyz23]

Hair pieces arent sh*t. the wearers make them sh*t/good

 

[Fanjeera]

As long as the system angles are fine and you don’t lower it too much, it will be just fine. It should also be thinned out, like when they make a thick hairline less thick, I don’t know the word. That is very important, most people don’t do that and end up looking ridiculous. Your goal isn’t to stuff your head with hair, it’s to fool everyone. Then with a proper haircut, alignment and color, you will look fantastic. I actually think that if I ever put a hair piece on again I’d dye it gold/white and the rest of my hair too. I’d be a proper playboy but kinda gay. I don’t mind because then women go “is he? Is he not?”, it drives them mad. Damn if only hair pieces weren’t so sh*t... I miss them.

The hairline will catch dirt and lift. That's what makes it look strange.

 

[matt0135]

Why do people still continue to post on here if they're not using a system anymore or not considering one? I don't get it lol .either you're happy being bald or you're not.

 

[BaldBearded]

I have noticed lots of advertisements here, in Israel, for cheap package deals to Turkey, for hair transplants that are only a couple of thousand Euro, including flight, hotel, transplant, and aftercare. The results I have seen, look pretty bad. Terrible hairlines, low low densities, and worse, guys who wind up shaving, and having to get the dreaded purple tattoo (SMP). The ads are amazing, showing N7 before pics and N0 after.

There are also tons of clinics here, pushing all sorts of quack treatments, lasers and all sorts of BS that do nothing but empty your wallet.

 

[hanginginthewire]

I have noticed lots of advertisements here, in Israel, for cheap package deals to Turkey, for hair transplants that are only a couple of thousand Euro, including flight, hotel, transplant, and aftercare. The results I have seen, look pretty bad. Terrible hairlines, low low densities, and worse, guys who wind up shaving, and having to get the dreaded purple tattoo (SMP). The ads are amazing, showing N7 before pics and N0 after.

There are also tons of clinics here, pushing all sorts of quack treatments, lasers and all sorts of BS that do nothing but empty your wallet.

Can you give us a specific picture example?

 

[BaldBearded]

Can you give us a specific picture example?

Like going out on the street and asking someone to pose for a photo?

 

[hanginginthewire]

Like going out on the street and asking someone to pose for a photo?

A picture of the transplant results you are talking about. Should be some examples online.

 

[BaldBearded]

Yeah, I will get right on that for ya!

A picture of the transplant results you are talking about. Should be some examples online.