Interview of Dr. Mahadevia on V- TV on 26th February 2012

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Dr. Mahadevi'a  Live interview by V- TV on 26th February 2012 on Hair Transplant

BHT after 1 year video- Presentation Surat GAPSCON 2012 at Surat

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Dr. Mahadevi'a  was invited for presentation of his work on Body Hair Transplant on 19th February 2012:

Follica may be next breakthrough in hair growth treatment?!

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Follica has raised money to begin a human trial of its hair cloning technology. According to the company’s website, the company has obtained “an exclusive, worldwide license from the University of Pennsylvania to develop and commercialise a breakthrough technology that has been demonstrated to stimulate the genesis and development of new follicles.” It is announced it had completed a $5.5 million Series A financing round.

Is this a first successful Human Hair cloning?

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Scientists in Berlin have used human adult stem cells to develop hair follicles using 3 D Biodegradable Scaffold, from which hair then grows naturally. The treatment provides new hope for people suffering from hair loss.Only a few hair follicles would need to be taken from the"patient"and used to generate as much new hair as is needed, which can then be grafted.
check this video:
http://youtu.be/iAS_k1IrJpA

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Restoration Robotics, Inc., MOUNTAIN VIEW, California, a medical device company, has on 14th March 2011 announced that they have received 510K clearance from (FDA) for a ROBOT  for harvesting hair follicles from the scalp in men diagnosed with androgenetic alopecia (male pattern hair loss) with black or brown straight hair.  The name of the Robot for this technology is ARTAS™ System.

ARTAS™ is a physician-controlled, state-of-the-art, interactive, computer-assisted system that enables harvesting of hair follicles during hair restoration procedures. It combines several features including a video image-guided robotic arm, special imaging technologies, small dermal punches, force sensor, robotic arm,and a computer interface. The ARTAS™ System is capable of identifying and harvesting individual follicular units to implement the follicular unit extraction (FUE) technique. The software that runs the instrument helps the surgeon target follicular units for extraction and also uses stereoscopic video images to guide the needle mechanism and robotic arm.

The robotic harvesting technique resembles that of follicular unit extraction ( FUE). The donor area, as in FUE is cropped to short length to enable the stereo camera system to visualize hair follicles. The imaging algorithms are capable of identifying follicular unit, determining their type (1 hair FU, 2 hair FU, 3 hair FU etc.) and calculating the angle, orientation & location of each follicular unit on the scalp surface. Using this position  & location data, the imaging system semi autonomously guides the robotic arm & mechanism to core & extract follicular units one at a time; The punch size is 1mm in ID. The coring of the follicular units is enabled by a proprietary punch designed that aims to minimize transaction rate. The system, using a feature called visual servoing, continuously tracks & adjusts to patient movement so that harvesting of targeted follicular units is precise. Based on inputs by the user, the degree of automation can be adjusted, e.g. the system may be configured to harvest 10-20 grafts sequentially. The harvested follicular unit may then be automatically transported to a vial where it is kept moist and cool. It may be possible to achieve harvest speed of up to 1000 grafts in an hour.

The Benefits
There is growing interest in FUE because of its many patient benefits, such as less discomfort and a quicker return to normal activities. The ARTAS™ System solves many of the technical challenges experienced by physicians currently attempting the FUE procedure which gives physicians and patients new choice. Rapid healing and lack of a linear scar, which makes this procedure different from the strip method.

Limitations:
The Robot is approved for only straight back and brown hairs and for those with curly , gray or blond hair may have to wait for some later date.

On a personal communication it was mentioned that the system may harvest up to 1000 grafts in an hour with Transaction rate under 6%.

For more :    www.restorationrobotics.com.

Effect on Graft survival of Dense packing

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Check this research paper: double click the picture to read it in separate view

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Well we can do up to 60 per sq. cm but we do not recommend it because of significantly reduced survival rate if transplanted over 30 per sq. cm. Check the attached pdf file of the research paper: For example, if grafts are placed at a density of 50 FU/cm2 but only grow at a density of 40 FU/cm2, the results would still look good to the eye because a density of 40 FU/cm2 looks good. However, in reality this represents a loss of 20 percent of the grafts, which is unacceptable in hair transplantation due to the limited donor supply.

Transplanting Crown

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Transplanting in crown with early hair loss has following drawback in your case at this stage and age of hair loss;
1. The miniaturized weak existing hairs in this area may not be able to sustain the surgery and some of them may be lost sometime after this procedure ( shock loss)
2. The Transplant may be possible between the existing hairs so we can only put small number of hairs without damaging the existing hairs
3. If you lose more hair in future around the area of transplant you will have central are of transplanted hair with surrounding halo of no hairs ; this will not look natural.
4. You can certainly improve the area by use of medications then why you need surgery?

 Photo from: http://www.bernsteinmedical.com/hairtransplantblog/can-the-hair-grafts-be-packed-together-densely/

Astressin-B Potential new treatment for hair loss & gray hair

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According to an article published in on line journal Plosone.org Million Mulugeta, D.V.M., Ph.D., co-director of UCLA’s preclinical stress biology research program at the University of California, Los Angeles, claim that they have uncovered a promising hair-loss treatment & may have the potential to affect hair color, including gray hair..

The experiment wasn’t focused on hair loss. Instead, it was designed to study a chemical compound that blocks the effects of stress on the gut.

The research team, during a study of the effect of a compound called Astressin-B while conducting stress-hormone experiments on mice that typically develop head-to-tail baldness as a result of being genetically altered to overproduce a stress hormone (The mice used in the experiments had been genetically altered to overproduce a stress hormone called corticotrophin-releasing factor, or CRF. Corticotropin-releasing factor over-expressing (CRF -OE)-mice that display phenotypes of Cushing's syndrome and chronic stress, including alopecia. CRF-OE mice develop bilateral symmetric hair loss in adulthood). The goal of the experiments was to study the effect of Astressin-B ((5 µg/mouse) injected peripherally once a day for 5 days) to determine whether it would block the effects of stress on the colon but accidental finding was the mice treated with Astressin –B had recovered the full cover of fur on the back in few weeks compared to the placebo ( injected with saline) given mice which did not recover. A sterssin-B induced pigmentation and hair re-growth that was largely retained for over 4 months (a significant period for average 2 years life of mouse) when mice were killed Histological examination indicated that alopecic CRF-OE mice had hair follicle atrophy and that Astressin-B revived the hair follicle from the telogen to anagen phase.

The team repeated the experiment several times and got the same results — bald mice grew new hair in a few weeks. The researchers also injected the compound into young mice before they went bald. Those mice never lost their fur.

The researcher said the compound appears to have affected the mice skin pigment as well as spurred hair growth. This could mean Astressin-B has the potential to affect hair color and gray hairs. Majority of Pigments were regained by about 1 week and the hair was regained by about 2 weeks

Temporary blockade of the CRF receptors could thus be a breakthrough therapy for alopecia particularly for patients in acute (chemotherapy, traumatic stressful events) or chronic stress setting.

Findings of a mouse study may not be applicable to humans, but results may spur more study of the role stress might play in human hair loss. Hair growth cycles are very different in mice and humans, so one could draw only limited conclusions from the research

The research would probably be useful only for hair loss related to stress, likes that caused by one-time events, rather than as a treatment for genetic baldness.

 

REGENERATIVE MEDICINE & STEM CELL THERAPIES- EMERGING FIELD IN HAIR RESTORATION

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Scalp cloning vs. Hair cloning?

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Your thought is ingenious but the scalp transplant would involve very major surgery under general anesthesia with higher risks. More over it will have circumferential scarring, which may not look natural.

 



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Warning for the use of Minoxidil!

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Well The reason they write not to use on shaved head is if you are having sensitivity to minoxidil and if you are exposing your shaves head to sun for long time there may be irritation. Although this is not very common but if you are having sensitive skin and if you have more sun exposure you may not apply Minoxidil with shaved head. Shaved head infact makes the application easy and with direct application on long hairs can make your hair stiff and the crusting on the scalp under the hair may not be easy for you to remove.

Same way hair loss can be due to many reasons some skin conditions with hair loss may have more skin irritation if Minoxidil is applied and therefore  it is best suited for hair loss such as Androgenetic alopecia ( male pattern baldness or common baldness) . Because this common baldness has some link to father or mother side genetically it is written on the information leaflet given with minoxidil that  those with no family history of hair loss may not use it. Since you certainly have a pattern hair loss it is Ok for you to use it without any problem. In fact it is the right indication for minoxidil

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Donor recharging, Donor Sealing or Donor Farming

"Recharging donor" area which is also known as "Donor sealing"  even called "Donor Farming" is not new by concept and some surgeons have even practiced this in past. The typical indication would be
1. When surgeon has by poor & aggressive planning over harvested a particular area of donor scalp and that looks thin compared to other parts of donor area. The best way to recharge is to take anagen BHT. When well performed there is no reason why BHT would not grow.
2. When the shock loss has occurred in donor area where hair does not grow back
3. when patient wants to keep the hair very short and want to avoid visibility of dotted scars. The transplanted BHT will bring back the pigments to the donor area and reduce the visibility
4. It may be useful esp. if someone wants to intentionally over harvest good quality scalp donor hair for better cosmetic result in the front and therefore replace donor with BHT instead of using BHT at the front or top.

More over when donor recharging done in the fresh wound immediately after extraction would cause higher chances of BHT growth rather than recharging done in the previous FUE scar with reduced blood supply.

Concealer or Hair Thickening Cosmetics

Toppik, Dermmatch or Nanogen are the Hair cosmetics or concealer which by static adhesion to the existing thin hair will thicken the hair and also by covering the skin reflect no light there by it can give the better cover and volume to the hair thinning area.



Hair thickening Fibres ( Nanogen, Toppik, Hair Magic), particles (DermMatch) , spray  (ProTHIK, Fullmore, Mane), scalp colour cream (COUVRe) or tattoo (Dermography) is temporary (party) solution.

It may have some value in early thinning and in post hair transplant early growth phase.

They are very inert material and would not harm your skin and hairs even on long term use. You can get more info on www.toppik.com , www.dermmatch.com or www.nanogen.com. They can easily be removed on shampoo wash.

Because these products are directly available on their website located abroad when some people in India may want to buy this in India following is the contact details in India:

1. Toppik powder in India: http://www.nutraskyncare.com/

Midas Chamber 301,
Opp. Laxmi Industrial Estate,
Off New Link Road,
Andheri , Mumbai – 400053.
Tel: 0226740022/32428898E-mail:- sales@nutraskyncare.com

2. Nanogen Powder

Telephone : 0-98241-46737 Email : admin@nanogenindia.com  

3. Hairouse Powder: ( More economical of the 3 )

 Nithyasha Health Care , 14, Rukimini Niwas, Gogtewadi,Senapati Bapat Marg, Mahim 16, Tel 224225096, 224225296, 09224585251

 
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