Hair Transplant Surgery: Does Post-Op Appearance Predict Final Hair Growth?

This question, from a member of our hair loss social community and discussion forums, was answered by Coalition hair transplant surgeon Dr. Glenn Charles and recommended hair transplant surgeon Dr. Carlos Wesley:

I notice in a lot of these post hair transplant pics people are posting, they have a lot of hair in the recipient site prior to shedding. It kind of seems like a preview of what their hair should look like after the grafts shed and regrow.

I never had a bunch of hair in my recipient sites. Sure, I could feel some stubble but visually could hardly see anything. I actually have less hair in my hairline now than I did before the procedure. I am almost six weeks along and it seems I have shed a lot. I also started Propecia (finasteride) three days pre-op. I had 1000 grafts to the hairline.

What I was wondering was, since I didn’t see any hair after the scabs healed which took about three weeks, does this mean I won’t have much density? I didn’t need to cover a large area but I do have fine straight hair.

What you see immediate post-op does not correlate with the final results. Hair restoration physicians use different hair lengths to work with during the procedure depending on what their staff is comfortable working with. Hang in there and try to remain positive and confident that you will have an improvement in the end.

Dr. Glenn Charles

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I didn’t see if you had follicular unit transplantation (FUT) or follicular unit extraction (FUE). This can also determine the length of the follicles when transplanted. Grafts from strip harvest are left slightly longer than those harvested via FUE (because you need those short in order to determine the exact exit/direction) in our practice. So, even within the same clinic, you may have variety in immediate post-op hair length.

Best of luck!

Dr. Carlos K. Wesley

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David (TakingThePlunge)
Editorial Assistant and Forum Co-Moderator for the Hair Transplant Network, the Coalition Hair Loss Learning Center, and the Hair Loss Q & A Blog.
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