Treatment for hair loss. Although there is no cure for hair loss, a number of treatments can slow or reduce hair loss, stimulate partial regrowth or replace damaged hair. Surgical hair transplantation can help some men who have advanced balding.
Female pattern baldness is a treatable condition. Without proper treatment, female pattern baldness is permanent. Many people with female pattern baldness are comfortable with how they look and don't seek treatment. However, your healthcare provider can help slow or replace your hair loss.
You still have the opportunity to take action and recover hair growth. It is never too late to start hair loss treatments as long as you have some healthy hair follicles.
It depends. “If a follicle has closed, disappeared, scarred, or not generated a new hair in years, then a new hair wouldn't be able to grow,” Fusco says. But if the follicle is still intact, yes, it is possible to regrow the hair—or to improve the health of the existing thinner hairs.
A visible scalp through your hair can be a sign that it's thinning (but not always). The factors that contribute to thinning hair (and thus a visible scalp) include stress, diet, vitamin deficiency and ageing.
Depending on how much hair you've lost, you could be a candidate for non-surgical treatments for restoring hair. There are a number of topical solutions such as shampoos and moisturizing conditioners that can revitalize and thicken your hair.
Hair loss may also be genetic. The most common genetic condition is known as female-pattern hair loss, or androgenic alopecia. Women with this condition might notice a widening of the part at the top of the head, often beginning when a woman is in her 40s or 50s.
Vivian Bucay, M.D., F.A.A.D., board-certified dermatologist at Bucay Center for Dermatology and Aesthetics says iron, zinc, biotin, and vitamins C, D, E, and B play a crucial role in hair growth.
Only riboflavin, biotin, folate, and vitamin B12 deficiencies have been associated with hair loss. Vitamin B2 (riboflavin) is a component of two important coenzymes: flavin mononucleotide (FMN) and flavin adenine dinucleotide (FAD) [22].
You can expect your hair to grow back after thinning in about three to six months, although the exact time period will depend on the individual.
Here's the hard truth: Little can be done to permanently change the diameter of individual hair strands. Thickening products can do wonders to temporarily plump hair strands, but when it comes down to it, fine hair is genetic and can't be changed.
Stress hair loss, or telogen effluvium, looks like hair falling out quickly from combing, washing, or even just touching the hair. The hair on the scalp may be thinning, but the scalp looks healthy and does not have scales or rashes.
As with male pattern baldness, female pattern baldness comes from hormone imbalances, specifically dihydrotestosterone imbalances, or DHT. This hormone is similar in structure to testosterone, but it is significantly more potent [3]. DHT can attach to receptors on the hair follicles, causing the follicles to shrink.
Hair follicles typically grow back within one to two months as long as your scalp does not need to recover from damage. If your hair follicles are damaged, it can take up to four years until they are able to regrow hair normally unless it is permanent, in which case no new strands will grow.
Causes for Hair Loss in Young People
Hair loss can happen for all sorts of reasons, for example, it can be related to diet, exercise, illness, stress, disease, or hereditary causes. For younger women, thinning hair is usually a result of poor nutrition, stress, disease, or changes in medications, like birth control.
It can be normal to see your scalp through your hair, particularly if you have naturally fine or light-colored hair. Hair density, color, and thickness all play a role in how visible the scalp is.
It is a condition that slows down the hair growth process as a result of a lengthened gap between the telogen (shedding) and anagen (growing) phases of the hair cycle. Hair loss, on the other hand, is when the production of hair is interrupted and stopped altogether. This is when balding happens.
"When it comes to brushing thinning hair, some clients think they need to be super-careful with brushing their locks so they don't cause more hair loss; however, the opposite is more true," says Shelly Aguirre, hairstylist at Maxine Salon in Chicago. "You want to stimulate the scalp to encourage MORE hair growth."
"Sudden thinning hair can be a symptom of anemia (low red blood cell count), hormonal issues especially related to events like pregnancy, or a thyroid disorder, which are all very common in women," says Dr. Peredo. If any of these are the case, hair loss won't be the only symptom present.