Recently, I read a well written summary of the follicular unit extraction (FUE) procedure, its advantages, and it's disadvantages by Dr. Ron Shapiro who recently started to experiement with FUE at his clinic. Today, I published it on our highly popular Hair Loss Q&A Blog. In my opinion, FUE has been overhyped online by some clinics while underestimated by others. Reading this well balanced article was extremely refreshing. I'd encourage anyone interested in considering FUE to read "The Evolution, Advantages, and Disavantages of Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE) Hair Transplant Surgery".

Feel free to offer your input on this thread.

Best wishes,

Bill (Falc)

I agree - an excellent article.

It's particularly useful in demonstrating that there is no universal right or wrong answer for the best technique, but that much depends on a variety of factors, ranging from patient physiology to available cash. For me, the clincher in going for strip was maximising the yield from the permanent safe zone.

Kudos to Dr Shapiro.

I find the article biased against FUE. There's no mention of the grafts lost when a strip is cut from the donor site.

yeah i too read that the other day on another forum and have to agree with you falc its a great write up and a refreshing read. As Acrobaz says kudos to Dr Ron for a great educational article

I agree that this is an excellent article. I would also add that IMO it makes sense for a potential HT patient to consult with a clinic that offers both FUT and FUE (or at least separate clinics that between them offer both). This way they should get the best opinions on both sides for which technique might suit them best.

I do have a question though. Dr Ron mentioned as an advantage of FUE

quote:

Ideal for repairing donor scars that can’t be excised

Does this mean that excising and reclosing a widened scar is the better first course of action (rather than filling via FUE) where it is possible?

Excellent info . Heres one he wrote for guys interested in strip

http://www.regrowhair.com/hair...richophytic-closure/

quote:

Originally posted by Curious:
I find the article biased against FUE. There's no mention of the grafts lost when a strip is cut from the donor site.

Curious, when a single blade scalpel is used in the hands of a detail oriented, top flight doctor such as Dr. Ron and Dr. Paul the loss is negligible--even if it is, say 5%--there is absolutely no data that supports fue being consistently that good on every patient.

There is no bias..fue is great and is embraced fully by Dr. Shapiro--what we don't do is pretend fue is something it is not.

Take Care,
Jason

[/QUOTE] Does this mean that excising and reclosing a widened scar is the better first course of action (rather than filling via FUE) where it is possible?[/QUOTE]

In many cases, reducing the actual scar via strip excision is the best option first. The idea is even if you can reduce a wide scar by 50% (ie scar is 8mm wide, reduced to 4-5mm) then there is simply less surface area to disguise.

Another point is for some patients, excising a wider than normal scars say 4-5mm wide, which is right outside the 1-2.5mm scars we are looking for, down to a 1.5-2mm that new thinner scar may be able to be truly disguised.

Of course, there are those who will simply not go through another strip session and for them fue is a great choice.

Hope this answers your question!
Jason

Thanks Jason yes that pretty much covers it.