Extreme levels of hair loss or baldness particularly according to the Norwood scale, such as level 6 and above may require more follicular units, but is it always ideal to transfer more units as we may all think?.

According to hair surgeons, various aspects such as;

The patient’s goals and his or her hair characteristics (thickness, texture, thinness, or coarseness) must be put into considerations before packing hair follicles in the bald region.

What some Surgeons Do!

In some cases, the hair transplant surgeons may not introduce the follicular units uniformly in the bald region and also, they may not transfer more hair follicles to the recipient region. With this, the hair density isn’t consistent throughout the scalp.

Ideally, some hair transplant surgeons confirm that it’s hard to obtain the original hair density after a hair transplant surgery. Therefore, expertise and experience plus the surgeon’s artistic skills can help a patient obtain natural results after the surgery that triggers an appearance of a fuller head.

With this, hair transplant surgeons pack more follicular units in the front and gradually reduce the packing volume as they approach the back of the scalp. The major reason for doing this is because an individual is basically viewed from the front than from the back or top of the scalp. However, this practice may not appeal to all patients since they have different goals, therefore, discussing your hair transplant goals before the surgery is essential.

Case Study

If we are to consider a level 6 baldness that is soon clocking to level 7 in a patient (according to Norwood scale), the patient sincerely has at least 340 to 400 cm2 of baldness to cover. This means that almost the entire top of the scalp is bald. In this case, a surgeon will have to solicit at least 15,000 follicular units to cover the bald region and also attain a density of 50 FU/cm2. On the other hand, a patient with a level 4 or 5 of baldness (Norwood scale) will require approximately 10,000 FU grafts to cover 200 cm2 of the bald area at 50 FU/cm2 uniformly.

Can a patient obtain a Fuller head?

In hair transplantation, the actual description of a fuller head basically differs from one patient to another. Hair transplant surgeons are mainly tasked to create an illusion of a fuller head since some patients, especially with extreme baldness can never obtain a fuller head in the real sense.

Also, hair transplant surgical approaches like FUE and FUT can help increase one’s chance of obtaining a better density, but this must be done by an experienced surgeon to avoid poor results. According to some surgeons, only 53% of hair follicles is required to make the scalp appear fuller with an ideal density. Therefore, it is not always about transferring more hair follicles to the bald region.