How Effective Are Scalp Exercises Before Hair Transplant Surgery?

This question, answered by recommended hair transplant surgeon Dr. Parsa Mohebi, was asked by a member of our Hair Restoration Social Community and Discussion Forums:

I’m researching a follicular unit transplantation (FUT) procedure, and recently met with hair restoration physicians to analyze my level of hair loss and discuss surgery. One surgeon said my scalp was tight (in the universal donor region) and I should start scalp exercises to increase my scalp laxity (or “looseness”). However, the other said my scalp demonstrated normal laxity and did not believe scalp exercises were helpful. Is this true? How effective and useful are scalp exercises?

Scalp exercises have had a large matter of controversy surrounding them for years amongst hair transplant surgeons, and thus have resulted in many different opinions on the matter. To answer the question of whether or not scalp exercises really work, Dr. Rassman and I published the first metric system to accurately measure the laxity of a person’s scalp without the need to guess or rely on a physician’s personal experience. The result of this study was a device called the Laxometer.

I had invented the Laxometer about 3 years ago and following its recognition we conducted a first time study to determine whether or not measuring scalp laxity really works and could have true value before hair transplantation. The result of this study was later published and demonstrated the importance of scalp laxity in follicular unit transplantation (which is what scalp exercises hope to increase).

Altogether, we do recommend scalp exercises in our practice to the majority of hair loss patients who need hair transplantation through the strip method. Those who are recommended to do so are not only the ones that have tight scalps, but also those who have average or even loose scalps but need a large number of follicular unit grafts to acheive their desired results.

Parsa Mohebi, MD

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Blake – aka Future_HT_Doc

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