Harper's Bazaar Reports on Scientific Advances Fighting Hair Loss
Hair Loss Among Women the Focus of New Research
Harpers Bazaar on Women's Hair LossEmily Dudding of Harper's Bazaar has written an interesting article called, "The Future of Beauty," which details the scientific advances to help get rid of fat, eliminate the flab around the waistline and even make working out less of a workout. What caught our eye here at Arocha Hair Restoration was the portion of the article devoted to what science is learning about hair loss in women.
The article quotes Angela Christiano, director of basic science research, department of dermatology, at Columbia University Medical Center in New York, saying researchers have primarily focused on hair loss among males -- not among women.
"Most trials center on male-pattern baldness, which is very different. Women lose hair all over, while men tend to lose the hair on the top of their head and keep a fringe between their ears," Christiano told Harper's Bazaar.
But there is reason for optimism: Christiano and her team have developed a technique for cloning human hair. Considering that the American Academy of Dermatology estimates that 30,000,000 women are affected by hair loss in the U.S. alone, and more than 20 percent of women over the age of 50 have noticeably thinning hair, we are keeping a close eye on these developments.
After removing hairs from volunteers, researchers separated the dermal papillae (the connective tissue at the base of the hair follicle), put them in a petri dish, then fed them tissue culture and nutrients. Within a few weeks, they started to multiply. The cultured papillae were then injected into human skin that had been grafted onto mice, where the hair began to grow on its own. Tests showed that the hair matched the DNA of the human donors.
"The holy grail of hair restoration is being able to start with a small number of cells and have them multiply," she says. "Our method is game-changing because we need only a few hundred donor hairs, the size of a dime or a nickel, instead of thousands. Even women with severe thinning can afford that."
Christiano is hoping to proceed to clinical trials within three years and thinks the procedure will be FDA-approved in as little as five years. We believe that may be a bit too optimistic, as these tests can drag on for a decade or longer.
In the meantime, more than 20 percent of the patients we see are women and we are very proud of the results we are able to achieve. To learn more about Pattern Hair Loss in Women, click here. And to see before and after photos of our patient results, click here.
