Hair Graft

If you thought your only solution for fighting hair loss was to use minoxidil, you're probably not alone. The abundance of minoxidil-related products being advertised on television and in magazines makes it seem like there's no other effective way to fight baldness. In fact, there is.

Hair Restoration Grafts

Several decades ago, doctors got the idea to treat bald spots by actually transplanting hair-growing skin from one area of a person's scalp to another area that had gone bald or was simply thinning. The idea came as a result of successful skin grafts used for other situations such as burn victims or severe wounds. The first hair grafts, while somewhat crude, proved successful enough that surgeons continued experimenting with and refining the procedure.

Today, hair grafting has become a much more delicate art than it was twenty years ago. The best surgeons no longer remove large "plugs" of skin and transplant them to bald areas of the scalp. Now, they take what are commonly known as "micrografts"--literally tiny areas of scalp (smaller than a grain of rice) that contain only a few hairs--and transplant them individually to the recipient area. Micrografts require quite a bit of skill, but the results are much better than the early skin plug procedures.

The advantages of using micrografts are many. First of all, since large pieces of tissue are not being moved the healing process is much faster and much less visible. In addition, moving tiny hair follicles individually allows the doctor to recreate your natural hair pattern, since the micrografts can be placed and angled to match your natural hair.