Advanced Hair Restoration Procedures to Help Young Patients Suffering from Hair Loss
A recent study from American Hair Loss Association finds that the number of younger hair loss patients is rising. Two thirds of Americans are likely to experience some degree of considerable hair loss by the age of 35, according to the study. The situation demands drastic changes in the way people perceive hair loss.
The preventative and proactive approach to hair loss adopted by young males indicates people are becoming more aware of the causes and treatment options available for hair loss including genetically induced baldness. The recent reports from International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery suggest that of those undergoing the procedure in recent years, over half of male patients were between the ages of 30 to 49.
There are several treatment options available to treat hair loss. The best way to treat androgenic alopecia is a combination of surgical hair restoration to replace the hair that has been lost, medical treatment to maintain the remaining hair, and possibly the addition of lasers and shampoos and conditioners to maintain healthy vibrant looking hair.
A new robotic hair restoration system is also gaining popularity in the U.S. The ARTAS robotic system is designed to assist the Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE) procedure, widely adopted by younger patients. It uses a 2-step removal process to increase the accuracy and speed of FUE hair transplants.
"The limitations of FUE have been that when you try to punch out the follicular units, the punch has to be perfectly lined up with the hair follicles. As you can imagine, when you're doing thousands of these in one procedure, it's very difficult to get each one exactly right and lined up," says Dr. Robert M. Bernstein of Bernstein Medical - Center For Hair Restoration in New York.
The ARTAS robotic system helps solve this issue. By lining up the cutting instrument with the follicular unit, the robot successfully extracts the follicular unit by going dead center, reducing any damage to the follicle itself. ARTAS robotic system is actually only doing the first step in
the treatment: separating the follicular units from the surrounding scalp. It doesn’t even actually remove them.
The system uses a 2-step punch system delivered by an image-guided robotic arm. At first, it delivers a miniscule sharp punch that initially scores the skin. Immediately following the first punch is a dull punch that is slightly larger, which actually separates the follicular unit from the surrounding tissue.
Following this, the follicular units are extracted manually with the help of forceps. The next step is to create holes in which the grafted follicular units will be replaced.
While the treatments are expensive and time consuming, it takes at least a year for the results to grow in. ARTAS system is beneficial because it gives a better hair transplant with much less damage to the graft which means much healthier grafts.
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