Body To Scalp Hair Transplants

While hair on the head, face, and body does have different attributes, research shows that these hairs begin to adapt to the environment in which they are transplanted. Overtime, they tend to mimic the hair on the head more closely. Additionally, we meticulously place the hairs to act as an ancillary support system to hair used from the donor or existing hair on the scalp to further accentuate the feel and look of thickness and density. The outcome is that the result will still look natural but the density will be far improved in comparison to a regular FUE hair transplant, if your donor hair is not sufficient to support a full transplant.

Similar to the characteristics of the hair, research also shows that the growth cycles begin to adapt to the cycling of the scalp hair as well. The verdict is still out on how closely this adaptation will get to the native scalp hair cycles, but you would only seek this option in the case where you simply don't have proper donor to fully benefit from a traditional FUE OR if you need more density to support a previous FUE hair transplant, in which you no longer have donor to utilize for another procedure. In other words, you have no other option to reach your desired goal. This is a good alternative, even if the cycles are not growing at the same pace as the scalp. The trick is they must be properly placed throughout the transplanted area so that the human eyes cannot perceive any difference of scalp vs body.

This question doesn't have such a straightforward answer. The truth is that it COULD have a higher transection rate because it is harder to extract hair from the body than it is from the scalp, but when done by skilled hands it should be negligible anyway. The reality is that most people don't care about how many live during a harvest on the body so long as the ones that are transplanted are living follicles. With that in mind, the transection rate will be negligible when done by the rightly trained hands.

Additionally, the reason why most facilities don't offer body to scalp transplants is due to a lack of ability to harvest the necessary amount of grafts in a short enough period of time where they can still be safely transplanted before graft death begins to occur due to time spent out of body. If they are too slow, the grafts that were removed earlier in the transplant (which are mostly your BEST, because they're scalp derived) will begin to expire. Because of this, choosing your team is absolutely crucial to success.

Body to scalp transplants requires an extremely well trained team that has top-tier time management skills, fast and safe harvesting capabilities, and anesthesia techniques that are not time consuming in order to safely execute a 1-day body to scalp hair transplant. Most facilities lack at least one of those three key components and are simply not equipped to perform one.

It is safe when done by the proper clinical team. Management of the local anesthesia and time in procedure becomes a more critical factor in regards to safety when doing a body hair to scalp transplant. Each client has a safe dose of the medications used to numb them, but your body metabolizes these medications during the procedure and it begins to speed up metabolization the longer you are exposed to the medications. If the team is not properly moving through the transplant phases and properly medicating, with acceptable harvesting speeds, then it becomes possible for a clinician to exceed what would be considered a safe dose or simply not be able to continue anesthetizing the patient (which would halt the case). Because of this, many facilities feel as though they simply cannot perform this procedure. Time is critical for anesthesia, but it's also important for graft health. The grafts can only survive outside of the body for a limited period of time, so structuring the case flow to ensure they are relocated to the recipient sites as soon as possible will ensure a more optimal clinical outcome. While this may sound intimidating, you shouldn't be hesitant to discuss it, it's really a very safe procedure and picking the right clinical team is important for any aesthetic procedure.

This is possible, but entirely dependent upon a proper assessment. For example, if you were trying to establish an entire hairline using only body hair, it wouldn't be recommended. However, if you have general thinning throughout the mid scalp, we could certainly discuss options for supplementary body hair usage.

Hypothetically speaking, YES! A Norwood 7 often may have enough donor hair to repair one area of the scalp, or at least make a dramatic improvement, but not enough donor hair to warrant pursuit of a singular FUE. Body hair can be used as an ancillary method to improve one or two areas, however, whether or not you are a candidate for this would require a consultation with our clinical team. Assuming the body hair is sufficient, the hair transplant can be performed.

Yes, you could be! This would require a consultation to determine as many issues may cause you to be a non-candidate such as alopecia areata, lichen planus, or lichen planopilaris.  However, if you were told you are not a candidate because you don't have sufficient donor hair and you have a good amount of strong body hair/beard hair, then you may be an optimal or ideal candidate for a body hair to scalp transplant.