Causes of unsatisfactory results
It is essential that you educate yourself before undergoing any cosmetic surgery. Consultation with a doctor or practitioner is necessary to fully under the risks and the extent of potential benefits of any cosmetic surgery. The doctor must comprehensively explain all aspects of the procedure to the patient during the consultation. If the patient is ill informed, then they may have unrealistic expectations.
A typical hair transplant surgery involves several thousand grafts. Normally, 10-15% of the grafts fail and the follicle does not grow hairs as normal. The success rate depends on the skill of the surgeon, any medical condition of the patient and the extent to which the patient follows the prescribed post operation care. It must also be noted that most of the grafts grow fully only after several months after the transplant. Hence, the full results of the surgery are not immediately apparent, it is advised to withhold judgements until at least 1 year. However, if even after the waiting period the patient is unsatisfied with the result of the surgery, he or she may opt for corrective surgery in order to increase thedensity of the grafts or make up for unsuccessful grafts.
Unique challenges
Correction of previous hair transplant poses some unique challenges. If the previous surgery was conducted by strip method, wherein a strip of skin is removed, and the rest is stretched and stitched close, then it may not be possible to perform the corrective surgery using the same method. It may not be viable to remove more of the scalp’s skin.
It is essential that you educate yourself before undergoing any cosmetic surgery. Consultation with a doctor or practitioner is necessary to fully under the risks and the extent of potential benefits of any cosmetic surgery. The doctor must comprehensively explain all aspects of the procedure to the patient during the consultation. If the patient is ill informed, then they may have unrealistic expectations.
A typical hair transplant surgery involves several thousand grafts. Normally, 10-15% of the grafts fail and the follicle does not grow hairs as normal. The success rate depends on the skill of the surgeon, any medical condition of the patient and the extent to which the patient follows the prescribed post operation care. It must also be noted that most of the grafts grow fully only after several months after the transplant. Hence, the full results of the surgery are not immediately apparent, it is advised to withhold judgements until at least 1 year. However, if even after the waiting period the patient is unsatisfied with the result of the surgery, he or she may opt for corrective surgery in order to increase thedensity of the grafts or make up for unsuccessful grafts.
Unique challenges
Correction of previous hair transplant poses some unique challenges. If the previous surgery was conducted by strip method, wherein a strip of skin is removed, and the rest is stretched and stitched close, then it may not be possible to perform the corrective surgery using the same method. It may not be viable to remove more of the scalp’s skin.
The
most suitable method for correction surgery is FUE method. In this
method, a hollow needle is used to extract the hair grafts one by one.
This allows removing the hairs from the donor area without removing any
more strip of skin. This method can be used to extract the follicles
from the side or back of the scalp if the hair is sufficiently dense.
However, if the density of the hair on the scalp is not sufficient, then
alternatives must be considered.
Body hair grafting
The major advantage of FUE technique is that it leaves tiny scars, each about 0.6-1 millimetre in diameter since a hollow needle is all that is used to extract the follicles. These scars easily heal almost completely and are not visible to the naked eye. Traditionally, for the strip method, the donor area selected is almost exclusively the sides or the posterior area of the scalp since it is much easier to hide the large scar.
Body hair grafting
The major advantage of FUE technique is that it leaves tiny scars, each about 0.6-1 millimetre in diameter since a hollow needle is all that is used to extract the follicles. These scars easily heal almost completely and are not visible to the naked eye. Traditionally, for the strip method, the donor area selected is almost exclusively the sides or the posterior area of the scalp since it is much easier to hide the large scar.
But
due to theabsence of any large scar, it is possible to extract hair
follicles from other body parts in the FUE technique. Hair follicles can
be extracted from arms, beard, legs, chest or underarms and grafted on
to the scalp. The donor area, after healing, is virtually unscarred, and
with proper aligning, the target area can have natural appearing hair.
Thus, newer techniques such as FUE allow for body hair transplant in
order to compensate for lack of hair on thescalp in order to correct
previous hair transplant.
