Thursday, December 6, 2007

terminology

Ways of marketing and oneupmanship sometimes create very confusing terminology for the layperson and following para will help to clarify I hope 1. HT or Hair Transplant was done as Punch Graft before the 20 years but due to bad cosmetic results it is no more done. Today the Follicular Method is the Gold Standard of Hair Transplant. In the older Punch method a circular hollow punch was used to remove a cylinder of hair bearing tissue from the donor site ( which contained hair roots or Hair Follicles). This was transplanted in the bald are. But this Punch Grafts grew 10 to 25 hairs in the bunch and that gave Baby Doll appearance. Later it was discovered that the naturally hair grows from the hair "Follicle" which can be in the group of one. two ,three or four and not in 10 to 25. This natural group of Follicles is called "Follicular Unit" or the "root" . The surgeons started separating the Follicular Units and that is also called "Graft". The method that uses such Follicular Unit Grafts is called Follicular Method. There are basically 2 methods of Follicular Transplant: (1. Strip Method and 2. FUE- stitch less method) In a usual "strip method" follicles are separated after strip is harvested from your donor site (from the back of your head). The donor area is closed by an absorbable stitch and the follicular unit grafts are individually dissected from the this strip for transplant. 2nd method which is more modern is "the stitch less procedure" (FUE- Follicular Unit Extraction). This does not involve removal of strip or stitches. The Grafts are individually extracted from the scalp with micro punch blade. As it is said there are more than one ways to skin a cat so are many minor variation in technique of FUE and are given different names as follows: Follicular Unit Extraction FUE - Most common and accepted name. FOX or FX ( Bill Rassman-LA) Woods technique, TOP-UP technique (Ray wood - Sydney) DHI (Direct Hair Implantation) FIT (Follicle Isolation Technique) (Dr. John P Cole-Atlanta & N.Y.)- SAFE (Surgically Advanced Follicular Extraction)- Dr. James A Harris- ENT Denver Colorado FUSE (Follicular Unit Separation Extraction) – Dr Arvind Poswal Follicular unit micro extraction (or FUM) - Dr. Epstein (NY) During the transition from old punch method to modern Follicular method there was a phase when surgeons cut the grafts of size smalled than that of a punch graft but bigger than that of Follicular unit they were named as "Minigrafts" or "Micrografts" and "Slot Grafts" or "MUG" ( Multi Unit Grafts) or "Paired Grafts" etc.