What Is Hair Transplant?
Hair is an important aspect of an individual’s overall appearance. An amply haired person, male or a female, is viewed and perceived in the society as virile, youthful and healthy. The concern for hair loss is therefore justified. In our society, there are age-old practices of using several animal and plant extracts to prevent hair loss.
Thick and dense hair significantly adds to the look of an individual. However, it is normal to lose some hair every day. Some people experience excessive hair loss. This type of hair loss can affect men, women and children alike. Androgenic Alopecia or male-pattern baldness is the most common cause of hair loss in men. People going through this type of hair loss usually inherit the trait.
Men who start losing their hair at an early age tend to develop more extensive baldness. In male-pattern baldness, hair loss typically results in a receding hair line and baldness on top of the head. Women may develop female-pattern baldness. In this form of hair loss, the hair can become thin over the entire scalp. With surgical hair transplantation, unlike medical treatments for hair loss, permanent results can be obtained. The most trusted and proven technique, which has stood the test of time, is Follicular Unit Transplantation (FUT). This technique involves removal of a strip of superficial layer of hair from the back and sides of the head. The strip is dissected into fine follicular units under magnification and individual follicular units are transplanted on to the bald area. Post hair transplantation, the survival rate of grafts is very important to achieve good results. Care has to be taken at every step, like making the grafts adequately sized and custom-directed slits for hair, following a no-touch technique, and a dedicated team has to work to ensure that the hair is transplanted at a reasonable speed so as to ensure maximum graft take rate.
Comparing FUE & FUT HAIR TRANSPLANT
Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE) and Follicular Unit Transplantation (FUT) are frequently compared as two totally different, even competing, hair transplant procedures. However, the only difference between FUE and FUT is the method by which follicular units are removed from the donor area at the back and sides of the scalp. The rest of the hair transplant procedure is essentially the same.
The harvesting method does have important implications for the hair restoration procedure. It affects the total number of high quality grafts that can be harvested from the donor area and ultimately, the fullness achieved from the hair transplant. The harvesting method of FUT via strip is superior to that of FUE for three reasons.
1.The FUT procedure allows the surgeon to produce the highest quality grafts by isolating the follicle units with minimum trauma.
2. FUT enables the surgeon to utilize the most permanent part of the donor area effectively.
3. The grafts of different sizes can be harvested so as to achieve the best possible results and practically no hair follicle gets wasted.
4. There is no need to shave the hairs for the FUT and there are no telltale signs of surgery after 5 days.