Each person has an average of 100,000 to 150,000 hairs and loses about 50 to 100 hairs per day, with an increase during seasonal transitions.

Alopecia refers to pathological hair loss, meaning when a person loses more than 100 hairs per day over a long period.

Baldness occurs when hair loss affects the frontal, temporal, or vertex regions.

There are five types of alopecia:

• Hereditary androgenetic alopecia: the most common, affecting 70% of men;
• Congenital alopecia;
• Acute alopecia: caused by stress, nutritional deficiencies, hormonal disorders, chemotherapy, or radiotherapy;
• Localized alopecia: caused by a scalp tumor, radiotherapy, alopecia areata, or burns;
• Alopecia areata: likely autoimmune in origin. It causes hair loss in "patches." It can affect the entire scalp (totalis) or the entire body (universalis).

The psychological impact of hair loss is significant, especially when it affects women. This is why this issue should not be taken lightly. First, patients should be educated on maintaining a healthy lifestyle (getting enough sleep, eating a balanced diet, avoiding smoking, and not overusing hair dyes or hairstyles that damage hair).

A topical treatment like 5% Minoxidil yields good results but only for a small portion of the population.

Taking Finasteride (a 5-alpha-reductase inhibitor) is an extremely interesting solution but may have side effects such as loss of libido or the development of gynecomastia.

Intramuscular injections of Bepanthen and Biotin also yield very good results. However, these therapies struggle to promote hair regrowth.

Regenerative medicine (PRP) helps stop hair loss, restore density, and promote regrowth (in 30% of cases in men and 70% in women).

However, when baldness is very extensive, or the aforementioned treatments do not yield good results, the only therapeutic option consistently providing a natural and permanent result, for both men and women, is hair micrografting.

TECHNIQUE

This procedure involves harvesting hair follicles to transplant them into bald areas. It is performed under pure local anesthesia, on an outpatient basis, and lasts between four and six hours, depending on the number of grafts to be transplanted.

A strip of scalp measuring 15 to 20 cm long and 1.5 cm wide is taken from the occipital region. While the surgeon closes the donor site, collaborators cut the strip under a microscope to obtain micrografts of one to three hairs.

The recipient area is anesthetized, and fine slits are made oriented according to the natural hair growth direction. The micrografts are reimplanted in a targeted manner to restore natural hair density and orientation. To avoid the "doll" or "plug" effect, grafts containing one to two hairs are used to recreate the hairline, and grafts with three to four hairs are used to fill the crown. Thus, 3,000 to 4,000 hairs will be reimplanted during a session.

POST-OPERATIVE CARE

Social downtime is ten days. A frontal edema will appear and descend along the face.

Very moderate pain, more like a sensation of wearing a "motorcycle helmet," is felt.

Crusts on the implantation areas will persist for about ten days. To facilitate their removal, sweet almond oil will be applied at night. A local antiseptic should be applied twice a day to the donor site scar.

The first shampoo will be done without rubbing on the fourth day using a neutral pH shampoo.

The grafts will fall out during the first three months and then regrow.

The final result will be achieved after one year.

The advantage of this technique is that the hairs taken from the occipital region are genetically and consistently programmed not to fall out. Thus, the permanence of the result is guaranteed.