PharmD had an FUE session with Dr. Paul Shapiro this week. Here is the thread he started regarding his experience.

http://hair-restoration-info.c...=639102424#639102424

Here are his surgery details along with his before and after surgery pics. Feel free ask him or SMG any questions.

1897 Grafts - 3347 Hairs
1's - 735
2's - 874
3's - 288

Great presentation there Janna. PharmD, the work looks fantastic as expected! I love the placement of your hairline. Keep everyone posted with some updates and grow well!

J - promising post, great pics..thats a nice size treatment for the frontal third and hairline placement is spot on

This doc does great FUE work, is it $7.00/graft?

Thanks Aaron and OH. I know PharmD expressed his frustrations on others who didn't keep their promise in updating their blogs so he didn't want to be another who didn't deliver. I agree, I think his hairline will end up just what he wanted.

HH,
Our current fue price is $6 per graft with $500 discount for travel expenses.

If anyone has any questions for me I'd be glad to answer. I'll keep updating the pics and try to get the lighting and resolution to match the above pictures. Hopefully I can provide the users of the board with some valuable information since I have fine hair, average donor density, and some thinning in the crown. Plus I wear my hair pretty short. In my before pictures my sides were clipped with a #1 (1/8") about a week before surgery and the top I usually clip with a 3/4 to 7/8" attachment. So as things heal up and grow over the next few months and beyond I hope I can give other readers/members an idea of what to except if they have hair characteristics like mine.

Pharm how old are you?

I'll be 37 in a couple months

Janna for hairhope we are charging 14.00 per graft.

I am extremely happy for Pharm...he is a great person, (smart bugger too!), and was a pleasure to work with during his research process.

I'm glad he posted his age so you can see that even though he has good donor and is 37, after discussion, we kept the hairline conservative because we can always add later on. There was a temptation to go more aggressive, but after talking things out, Dr. Ron, Matt and Pharm opted to throttle back just a little bit.

It will be great to follow his progress.

Special thanks to Janna for the excellent photos as usual!!

Take Care,
Jason

Nicely done. This high quality FUE procedures as starting to sneak up into high graft counts. Quite exciting. I look forward to watching this case unfold. Make sure to keep us updated with a blog PharmD.

PharmD, thanks for being open to sharing your experience and results.

I'm kinda curious to know what your short-term and long-term plan might be. It looks like you'll have a hair-line again, so short-term will you just go with a #2 or #3 buzz on top and enjoy the hairline framing your face some? Just wondering, because your forelock and all the way back to the crown look pretty thin in the top-down pictures. Looks like nw4 territory or rapidly approaching. It doesn't really look like you'll be able to grow it out with this HT because of the thinning hair behind the FUE grafts (I could be completely wrong). I think it might look really good with a short buzz though. I've thought about doing that with FUE. It could look good as long as one kept at least some hair behind the grafted hairline.

Long-term, are you thinking a larger strip procedure might be in your future to address your forelock, midscalp and crown?

I'm just asking, because these are the types of questions I'm facing myself. Thinking about FUE, but realizing I may need strip later.

Thanks again for contributing to the forum. It really helps those of us still on the fence.

quote:

Originally posted by hairloser1:
PharmD, thanks for being open to sharing your experience and results.

I'm kinda curious to know what your short-term and long-term plan might be. It looks like you'll have a hair-line again, so short-term will you just go with a #2 or #3 buzz on top and enjoy the hairline framing your face some? Just wondering, because your forelock and all the way back to the crown look pretty thin in the top-down pictures. Looks like nw4 territory or rapidly approaching. It doesn't really look like you'll be able to grow it out with this HT because of the thinning hair behind the FUE grafts (I could be completely wrong). I think it might look really good with a short buzz though. I've thought about doing that with FUE. It could look good as long as one kept at least some hair behind the grafted hairline.

Long-term, are you thinking a larger strip procedure might be in your future to address your forelock, midscalp and crown?

I'm just asking, because these are the types of questions I'm facing myself. Thinking about FUE, but realizing I may need strip later.

Thanks again for contributing to the forum. It really helps those of us still on the fence.

Excellent question. I think the top down pictures are a little deceiving, but you're right, it could be progressing to a NW4, time will tell. But it's definitely not thinner directly behind my Fue grafts. In my opinion, it is thinner in the crown and possibly spreading slowly from there. To say "It doesn't really look like you'll be able to grow it out with this HT because of the thinning hair behind the FUE grafts" is inaccurate in my opinion. Please look at my consultation picture below and imagine it with my new hairline. I think I could grow it out and have pretty decent coverage. For how long though is anyone's guess, especially when you get to my age. My hair hasn't changed much since my early to mid twenties (crown thinning mostly) and at 37 I'll take that gamble that it won't all fall out in a matter of a couple years. I've never had thick hair, as in hair shaft diameter. When my donor area was shaven down to take a picture of the donor density my hair had to be dyed with mustache dye so it would show up on the camera. My hair is really light when cut down to a #0 guard possibly giving the illusion that my hair is thinner directly behind the FUE grafts. I believe my back donor was 75 grafts/cm2 consisting of mostly 1,2, and 3 hair graft counts which is average as far as density goes. The sides had the same graft count but I think they are mostly 1 hair grafts with not as many 2's. But you're right, it could all fall out next year. I only know that my hair has been stable for 10 years, and maybe it will be for 10 more or longer. Maybe not.

So on to my options if for some reason everything fell out, worst case scenario. I have no problem buzzing it down short to an 1/8th of an inch if I needed to. And the great thing about FUE (my personal opinion) is that it will allow me to use a #1 or #2 guard if I want without fear of having a possible visible linear scar exposed from ear to ear. The reason I didn't shave down really short permanently (I did try it though) before was because my hairline looked like a McDonald's sign and I'm pretty tall (6'4”) so that's what most people would see when looking at me.

I also could get more FUE and bring it back to the crown if it all fell out. This would leave me with a thin maybe bald crown but I'd just keep it cropped short and as I mentioned earlier, I'm tall, so not many people are looking at the top of my head. I'm also a big believer in the less is more look when it comes to short cropped hair. I think I could pull it off and still look good. As for long-term, I've pretty much ruled out a large strip procedure because I want to keep the option of keeping it short (#1 or #2 guard) if everything just fell out. I'd be happy if I could pull off a Jason Statham look for the long term by going with FUE only. I think that is a realistic goal.

I also have been using Rogaine Foam for about 2 years. I have taken Propecia before, about 10 years ago for about a year, but unfortunately my estrogen levels increased 3-fold in that period and I experienced some bad estrogenic side effects which have dissipated since discontinuation. I am going to get blood tests and check out my DHT, Test, and Estradiol levels and then I'll make a decision on whether I want to start Propecia again and control my estrogen/Estradiol levels by using an aromatase inhibitor. My goal with this approach would be to keep estradiol within the low/normal male range. If I can achieve that, maybe I'll regain some crown coverage or at least hold on to the hair that I have for a longer period of time.

I've attached one of my consultation pictures below where my hair was about 1&1/2 inches long on the top and wet. You can see where I drew the black conservative line and I think The B Spot drew on the blue line, the most aggressive hair line that SMG would consider after looking at many pictures I sent. When I met with Dr. Paul Shapiro in person we agreed that it was too aggressive and would take too many grafts for the amount of temple recession I had. The consultation pic was from a couple months ago and I think it's a fair representation of what my hair looks like when grown out a bit. Remember that my hair is less than 2 inches long in that pic. If I grew it out a couple more inches I would suspect there would be better coverage.

So that was my thought process when I decided to get a hair transplant. I think I covered all my bases and have a plan for where ever nature wants to take my hair. Did I gamble a little? Sure. But I have a plan, and I think that's one of the most important things someone should consider before getting a procedure done. Thanks for the good questions hairloser1.

consultation_pic.jpg (99 KB, 116 downloads)

Thanks Jana for the cost reply and Jason said he will subsidize the difference when I come up for a FUE treatment!

quote:

Originally posted by the B spot:
Janna for hairhope we are charging 14.00 per graft.

Special thanks to Janna for the excellent photos as usual!!

Take Care,
Jason

Here's a pic of Jason Statham. As I mentioned above, If my hair looked like this in 10 or 15 years I'd be happy. I think my hairline would be a little stronger than his in this pic but I would fill in behind it (if I ended up losing everything) with FUE at about the denisty he has in the pic and just keep it short as he has it styled. I think it's a realistic goal with FUE if I went to a NW4 or NW5.

jason-statham-6-10-08-thumb-500x323-783.jpg (36 KB, 140 downloads)

PharmD,

I think you really have yourself a good game plan, and a good back up plan if your hair loss intensifies. Kudos for that! You'll be much better off in the long term for that.

quote:

Originally posted by aaron1234:
PharmD,

I think you really have yourself a good game plan, and a good back up plan if your hair loss intensifies. Kudos for that! You'll be much better off in the long term for that.

Thanks aaron1234, I appreciate it. Looks like your coming along great.

Love the result so far! Janna, Is Dr. Paul doing more FUE than Dr. Ron?? Or are more being posted of Paul. Thanks!

I think Dr. Ron may have done a few more but Dr. Paul's patients have posted more. Few of Dr. Ron's patients said they'd post but they must have lost track of time.

Pharm,
thanks for such a detailed answer! And yes, your hair does look a lot thicker in the photo you attached. It's even wet in that pic and looks much thicker.

I think having light hair is going to be a big advantage for you. I think the FUE approach with possibly going with a short buzz at some point is a great approach. You don't see too many guys talking about that but it seems like it would work well with the right characteristics.

In the short-term I agree that it seems you will be able to grow it out and have a nice improvement.

I'm really looking forward to seeing how it turns out. A FUE session with SMG is looking better and better to me.

Thanks again.

PharmD, would you be willing to post some 5-7 day post-op pics and some 10-14 days post-op pics? I am very interested to see how quickly the recipient and donor area heals using the FUE process.