The Health Blog

Hair loss, from thinning to balding, is a condition that affects both men and women as they age. While there are many aspects of aging that are difficult to embrace, losing one’s hair can be particularly traumatic. Fortunately, many advances have been made in treating hair loss and new treatments are being discovered as medical science progresses. Among the most cutting edge research involves hair cloning, hair follicle regeneration, and scalp transplants.

Research into hair cloning, also called hair multiplication, is being conducted by scientists and hair restoration physicians utilizing stem cell research. The basis of hair cloning is to create multiple hair follicles from one original follicle. The current method of hair transplantation requires removing hair follicles from the back and sides of the head and relocating them to the balding areas in front. This process limits the amount of hair that can be transplanted by the amount of donor hair available. With hair cloning, there would be an unlimited supply of hair available for transplanting, making a new full head of hair possible for anyone.

Another approach into restoring hair growth is hair follicle regeneration. This was once thought impossible in adults, but experiments on mice have shown that hair follicles considered inactive can be induced to grow hair again. When the skin is wounded, there is period of time during the healing process in which the skin cells can be triggered into forming new hair-producing follicles that weren’t there before. Scientists are hoping to develop practical and effective methods of treating hair loss in people with this exciting new discovery.

Perhaps the most extreme method of treating hair loss being researched is a complete scalp transplant. Scientists at The Cleveland Clinic are hoping to help severe burn and trauma patients with this approach, but if they are successful the results would most likely lead to cosmetic hair loss treatments as well. Currently, a crucial factor for organ transplants is the toxic and expensive medication that patients are required to take for life, which makes sense with life-saving surgery, but not for cosmetic reasons. The researchers are attempting to develop an immunosuppressant drug for humans that would make scalp transplants possible and practical. The new drug has been tested on mice and must only be taken for one week. If testing on humans is successful, scalp transplants may become a very real possibility.

With the ongoing research and advances in hair loss treatments, it has made dealing with hair loss more manageable and provides hope for an eventual hair loss cure.