[dr.aviansh]

Originally Posted by CarNerd

Is that a wig? :confused

No Aamir always had a laid back hair line, it's just that he kept long hair so it never felt evident. I have seen most of his films and I have noticed that when he is facing the gushing wind for a romantic scene, that very hairline gets clearly visible.

SRK has been using some amazing hair toupees since Don (2006) and Om Shanti Om. Aamir Khan got a transplant in Taare Zameen Par. In Fanaa, he had a toupee as well.

GTO Sir, I recommend you to try Collagen supplements along with the vitamins your Trichologist would recommend. First try non invasive, including Finasteride (topical only) with 10% Minoxidil. During the initial weeks you might notice more hairfall than usual but don't worry that's how minoxidil works. Be sure to use it for ATLEAST 6 months before you conclude anything.

If that doesn't work, TP, would do. A friend of mine got FUE technique done from Indore in 2017. He is pretty happy but I don't find his look fascinating. It's just that he isn't bald anymore. I can't post his photo publicly. So basically if you want VOLUME don't go for Transplant.

What Salman has done is, that he has gotten a transplant in his hairline to make it look natural. Just behind it, he wears a toupee.

Actors like Tiger Shroff, Raj Kumar Rao, Anil Kapoor, Ajay Devgan, Saif Ali Khan, Ranbir Kapoor use toupees. Mostly everyone except for Abhishek Bachchan, Ranveer and Aryan Kartik have got hair jobs.

I'm not guaranteeing what each and every actor has done, but I was a Bollywood buff once so i used to notice changes in hair patterns. Hence my speculations.

[headbanger]

Originally Posted by dr.aviansh

What Salman has done is, that he has gotten a transplant in his hairline to make it look natural. Just behind it, he wears a toupee.

Actors like Tiger Shroff, Raj Kumar Rao, Anil Kapoor, Ajay Devgan, Saif Ali Khan, Ranbir Kapoor use toupees. Mostly everyone except for Abhishek Bachchan, Ranveer and Aryan Kartik have got hair jobs.

Completely Off Topic!!!

TBHP never ceases to amaze me. But I had to respond after googling what the heck is toupee. All through the time since our adolescence kicked in, we were running behind to have those hairstyles like that superstar donned. No, it's not that oil or shampoo or salon or that silky smooth keratin treatment , the bloody answer to that elusive hairstyle is toupee.

[One]

Originally Posted by headbanger

Completely Off Topic!!!

But I had to respond....

So did I after looking at the topic of the thread and your ID

[EV NXT]

WARNING: What they don’t tell you about hair transplants:

Check if you have a keloid tendency - if so your scalp would develop keloids after the scabs fall off.

[Asish_VK]

This thread came out on the perfect time.

I am thinking of getting a transplant. I lost so much hair recently and somehow my Wife & parents are not allowing to go with the shaved head.
They are insisting me to get a Transplant

Thought of checking it out and My god! there are 1000's of hospitals everywhere in India, choosing the best one seems very tedious task.

I will be closely following this thread and hope I will get some good suggestions here

By the way, If anyone knows or have any experience of Transplant in Hyderabad, please suggest the Best Surgeon / Hospital for the same

Thanks in advance.

[V.Narayan]

Around 2012-2013 an employee of mine then in his fifties went for a partial hair transplant. He took a conscious call not to go for a full thick type. He is basically a good looking man, well maintained and with a partial transplant he ended up looking like a smart 55 year old versus looking like a 55 year old trying to look 35. I thought that was a cool decision. His motivation came because after a bad marriage he was re-marrying a lady many years younger!. They remain happily married. :-)

[mayankk]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

His motivation came because after a bad marriage he was re-marrying a lady many years younger!. They remain happily married. :-)

Nice. You're leaving us to draw our own conclusions then.

[divinedoc]

Besides surgeon selection, patient selection is very important. Procedure not for everybody. A load of transplants being done by technicians in skin clinics with little experience. Ideally plastic surgeons doing dedicated hair transplant should be the best for the job. A detailed assessment is imperative before any transplant procedure. All done under local anesthesia so excellent safety profile.

[Brumby]

Though retaining one's look is a personal choice, I have just one opinion regarding this issue.

If there was a way to regrow hair, the richest of the men in this world would not be bald.

Though initially I believed that some medication may slow down the rate of hair loss (not regrowth) but after personally experiencing I just do not believe in what all these hair treatment clinics and doctors advertise. No offense to any one but that's my personal opinion.

Nothing works, no sprays, medication, collagen etc. Whenever I told my doctor that there is no difference that I can notice, she come out with lots of excuses which related to my lifestyle and were the reason for ineffective treatment.

The biggest lie that I have heard is, "its because you are a vegetarian, so there is no source of proteins and collagen in your diet". Multiple times the doctor tried to convince me to take collagen from fish (retailing at about INR 8000/-) for a month's consumption, however I refused to give in.

If not eating meat/fish was the reason, then except for a few vegetarian men the whole male race on the planet would have glowing crowns on their heads.

The best is to look back at your family tree and hope/pray that you inherited the genes from the side which has better hair retention.

In my case I never saw my father with hair on the scalp and he is 30 years elder to me. I have seen him trying lots of methods to re-grow his hair without any success. My maternal family has better hair retention, so probably I might get to 50 without looking bald.

[WanderinNomad]

GTO, I am the perfect person to answer this. Here is the answer to all your questions.

Originally Posted by GTO

- Any BHPians who can offer hair transplant advice? Am sure many have been through the process. Dos & don'ts?

Just go for it. Better than wasting money on all solutions in the market. Only one thing, go to the best doctor you can afford. The only problem is finding a good doc since this is an industry plagued by unethical practices in India and abroad.

- Any highly recommended doctors in Mumbai, and elsewhere?

Dr. Bhatti, Darling Buds. Just search him up. One of the most ethical and helping doctors I have ever found. (In any discipline). Not to forget one of the best Hair Transplant surgeons in the WORLD

- What is the life of the transplanted hair? 10 years? 20? Do we have to do a transplant later again for the same area?

Well, I am at 3 years without any degradation. Will link a forum down. You can read stories of people with 25 years down the line.

In short, If you are 42 you will not need anything till 57. But even if you do just because of ageing, it will be a small procedure. It will be much more affordable than spending money for years on useless products that don't work.

- How is Eugenix? They are heavily marketed. Based in North India with branches elsewhere (including Mumbai). Doctor profiles seem impressive. Any reviews on Eugenix?

Yes I had gone to Dr Pradeep Sethi. In short, they are good, part of IAHRS so you are on the right track. But was costing double of what Dr. Bhatti was offering

- Any comments on Finasteride, Minoxidil, Redensyl etc?

Just 3 drugs are FDA approved-
1 Finasteride- please take it everyday after HT. And if you are wondering, there are no side effects in 99% of patients. The internet is wrong. Its kind of compulsory if you are going for an HT.

2 Minoxidil - mandatory till 6 months after HT. After that, its tyour wish. Will work until you apply it.

3 Ketocanazole 2% shampoo - once or twice a week - yes it has an additional use apart from preventing dandruff

No other drug is proven till now. period.

- If I'm just fixing the front hairline area, do I need to go full bald before the procedure, or not?

No, you can cover the transplanted area with existing hair. Best advise on this will be the HT surgeon.

- Any before / after pictures from BHPians who've done the hair transplant?

Will link my thread so that you can go through my progress month wise. Also, you can go through many other long term ownership reviews on the same forum

- What did you pay per graft? Or in total?

2500 grafts -RS 1,25,000/- . So, do the maths.

By the way I got mine in Feb 2019 at age 29. Now I am 32. One of the best decision I made. Just that I should have got it done sooner at 26-27 instead of thinking about it.

Feel free to reach out to me because I did my Phd in it before jumping.

[Rajat347]

Thats an interesting thread !

I have undergone HT with 2000 drafts on front and 2000 on rest of the temple area. The new area did grow but I am still losing my existing hairs. HT cannot alone change the look.
In order to make hair look thicker we need to get hair fibres applied or apply a patch.

[shiva75]

For me, hair thinning just before turning 40. Significant thinning from forehead and progressively moving back looking like a half moon. Did not go as far as going half moon but quite thin on the top.

Since the last few months, I have started shaving and gone completely bald. My colleagues are now used to the look and prefer it to my previous one. Good luck on the hair transplants !!

[Pkumarblore]

Hello @GTO, I see many advises and suggestions here which seem right from each ones perspective. I'll share my experience which may be of some use to you. I started losing hair from my college days which I thought was normal for some time considering genetics and life style. By the time I was 37-38 I had lost almost 50% of my hair in the frontal region and about 75% in the crown region.

This was in 2010-11 when I started finasteride + minoxidil treatment. It works to a certain extent as long as you continue the treatment. You will notice excess hair fall in the first 2 months, but then hair regrowth will appear. The concentration of regrowth may not be uniform all across your scalp.

I was like OK with the progress since it dint involve any invasive procedure(which I am personally totally against). I continued taking the finasteride pills for about a year or so and then stopped it., not because I had any side effects. I just stopped it since I dint like popping pills everyday. Till 2016-17 I had a decent hair coverage with just the minoxidil. But over the last 2-3 years I have noticed the effects of minoxidil weakening, so I guess it works reasonably well till a certain point of time in your life depending on age & genetics coupled with lifestyle. My current situation is I don't look excessively bald from the front, but my crown region is going bald.

My suggestion would be try the finasteride + minoxidil treatment and see the results for yourself. You should know that in about 6 months time. After that its your call anyway.

[Raghu M]

I am in my mid thirties. I lost some hair after moving to Hyd immediately. That was when I realized that I should do something about it. When I shaved off my head as per a religious vow, the person who shaved my head mentioned that I had loads of dandruff and that it is not visible to everyone generally. I got the entire dandruff removed (he removed it with his razor and trust me, it was very painful and burnt like hell). After that miraculously, my hair fall almost stopped. I used to shampoo everyday and that helped with dust not accumulating.

I also visited a trichologist during the time and she suggested Finpecia 1 mg (Cipla). At first I hesitated as side effects showed infertility among a few others. It also mentioned that once you stop taking medication, the side effects go away slowly. Assuming I will stop after a while, I started using the medication. And to my surprise, the results were amazing. The hair got thick and many of my friends noticed that I did not have a thin partition anymore. However, after marriage I had a lump (not noticed directly but felt internally) kind of a pain in my chest (right side). I was worried that it would be some kind of cancer (thanks to Google). I immediately met my family doctor and he suggested a scan. The radiologist who did the scan told that it's nothing but can be treated if you want it to go away fully. I got back to my doctor with the results and the first thing he asked me to do was stop that medication immediately. He even warned me that a few more days of that medication could even result in kidney related problems. I was so scared that I immediately stopped that medication. I guess having good kidneys is more desired that better mane.

Although my hairstyle is pretty fine now, it's definitely receded a little. Some tips I think will definitely help with slowing down hair loss.

1. Avoid plastic (all types including water bottles)
2. Move to a more organic diet (no packaged food/drinks at all)
3. Use only cold pressed oils
4. Avoid all refined items (sugar, oil, flours, white rice etc.)
5. Try including millets to your diet and reduce oil
6. Use at least 3 to 4 types of oils and rotate regularly (groundnut, flax seed, coconut etc.)
7. Exercise and get good sleep

Balding is a process that can be rarely avoided but definitely slowed down. I guess Jeff Bezos could have a bush but chose to remain bald for a reason. He can employ the world's best doctors and even have the best treatments. There are somethings that only nature gives us for free (hair, teeth, eyes etc.), we need to take care of them maintain them well. Everything else is artificial, can never come close as nature. Good luck.

[rajvardhanraje]

Hi GTO, I did mine in Mumbai in 2017 in my late twenties. Let me elaborate the details.

Level of Baldness: I have MPB and started losing hair in my late teens. By the time I did my transplant in 2017, I had Level 5 baldness.

Transplant Method: This again varies depending on the doctor/medical institute you opt for. For the past decade, the norm is the FUE method (Follicular unit extraction). Now this can be done with different levels of technology and tools. It consists of 3 parts - Extraction, Drilling and Plantation.

• Extraction can be done manually using basic tools, using a mechanized drill, and using a robot.
• Drilling can be done manually by hand or by using the mechanized drill tool.
• The plantation can be done either by hand or using a robot.

In my case, the extraction and drilling were done using the mechanized hand held tool and the plantation was done manually by hand.

Procedure Experience: It begins with shaving the complete head using a trimmer at the closest setting. I had 2 sessions in 2 days, each consisting of 4 hours. In each session, the extraction consumes about 2 hours and the drilling+plantation consumers 2 hours. Although they say it is completely painless, you can expect mild pain especially at the beginning when being administered with the local anesthesia injections. Sometimes the effect subsides causing mild pain. In this case you can inform the doctor to administer a few more for the time being. For me, the bigger concern was neck pain. They make you tilt it to either extremes for long durations. I suggest to have a light meal as during the initial phase, they make you lie down on the belly for a couple of hours.

• Grafts: In my opinion, it is very difficult to ascertain the number that the doctor quotes and actually plants. In my case, he said it came to around 3500. Some might quote a much higher number.
  
• Cost: Back then it cost me 1.3L. In today's date, he quotes about 2L for the same. This particular clinic always quotes bulk rates for the transplant rather than a per graft rate. The doc says, the actual number might vary during the procedure depending upon a plethora of parameters.
  
• Areas: This is something we can align on with the doctor. My level of baldness was 5. I opted not to push my hairline ahead and continued with the receded one for a more natural look and high density in the frontal area along the hairline considering the limited number of grafts. The grafts transplanted in the mid-scalp were lesser with lower density. I opted not to transplant any grafts in the crown area as the success rate of the graft acceptance in this area is very low and my main target area was the frontal one where I wanted a higher density of hair.

Post Procedure Experience: For the first 2 days, the doctor recommends to sleep in a semi-reclined position as the back of the head is bandaged. This cab be taken off in 2-3 days. This is followed by a session to remove blood clots on the transplanted part.

• Precautions: No heavy workouts for the first 2 weeks. I hated this part.
• Post 2 Weeks: Every fortnight for the next 2 months, there will be alternating needling and PRP sessions.
• Medications: The doctors recommends a combo of finasteride, minoxidil and multi-vitamins. I just had the multi-vitamins for a few weeks. Did not opt for finasteride due the the possible side-effects and minoxidil since it is a temporary booster. Its effect wains off as soon as the application is stopped.

Apart from this, there were no restrictions which continues till date. I get PRP sessions typically every 4 months just as a booster. It takes hardly 45 min and costs about 4K per session.

Results: As of now, it has been almost 5 years and I haven't lost any of the transplanted hair till date. The reason being, I never opted for temporary short term boosting measures. Regarding the longevity, although on paper they should last for a lifetime, my doctor did mention that realistically they should last for about 15 years.

Recommendation: Considering the efficacy and safety, I would recommend it. But in your case, seeing you in the pics, you have just started losing hair and currently stand at about Level 2. At this stage even if you do get the transplant, you still stand the risk of losing hair in the mid-scalp area naturally. Now this area wont be worked upon in the transplant and will be administered boosters like minoxidil. Down the line in a few years, the frontal transplanted area will be more dense with a bold hairline and middle area would be bald. The look won't be natural. Personally, I would recommend it only to those with Level 4 onwards.