Heva Clinic - Istanbul

Before going to Heva for my beard transplant, I was about to go to a clinic whose name I will not mention. Let’s call it clinic A. This clinic had me convinced that they could give me a full Viking beard, and I was very excited about it. But at the end of the day, I am a practical man, and something about it did not feel right. To start with, I have thin hair at the back, and to add to that, their timeline seemed a bit unrealistic based on what I was reading from people’s blogs. I decided to get a second opinion at Heva, and I am glad I did. When I met my surgeon, he was surprised at what the other clinic had offered, and he spent a good hour explaining what was possible, what was not, and the effects of each option. I had been angling for a lower hairline, and he told me that while that would look good in the moment, as I was 29 at the time, it would not be as appealing in 10 years. So, I was better off getting a cheaper procedure that would look good in a decade. He also talked me out of overharvesting my scalp, as this would cause thinning later on. While I was not exactly happy to hear that my grand ideas were facing pushback, I appreciated that he was not just telling me what he thought I wanted to hear and that he was being realistic. In the end, I chose to go to Heva, and it turned out to be the best thing I could ever have done for my beard. It’s filling in as expected, and I can already see why clinic A’s expected growth rate was unrealistic. If you want people who will tell you the truth even when it hurts, choose Heva.

I have come across so many stories of people going abroad for medical treatment, only to be told that they owe extra money for things like anesthesia, aftercare services, or even medication, yet they did not know about these costs when they were traveling. Knowing this, I printed out the invoice and the payment receipt from Heva before traveling for my FUE hair transplant. But it turns out that I did not need it because they never asked me for a single cent for anything, even though they had often gone out of their way to accommodate me, such as offering me a free trip to do some shopping when I arrived. Thank you for your amazing services as well as for running an honest business.

My hairline started receding and thinning when I was in my mid-thirties. But since I had afro hair and had not really heard of an afro hair transplant, I just went with the flow, albeit uncomfortably, knowing that baldness was my inevitable destination. My girlfriend (now fiancée) later read about the afro hair transplant as one of her cousins had gotten the procedure, and his hair was filling out quite well. I did not need any convincing, and I immediately started looking for afro hair transplant clinics and eventually narrowed them down to Heva, who had already done many such procedures. Of course, I chose them for other reasons, too, but the fact that they understood my hair was the biggest selling point. We went forward with an Afro hair transplant where my surgeon used 3,500 grafts. Since I have very tightly coiled hair (4C), he used a manual extraction method to make sure that he did not cut the hair root, as this is highly likely with my hair type. He was also very methodical in the implantation. As much as I do not know much about hair, I could tell that he and the technicians were being extra careful with my grafts, which made me very comfortable. I am happy to say that this level of care paid off because 12 months post-surgery, I have a 95% graft survival rate, which is just out of this world. In that year, my donor area has fully healed, and I do not even have a visible scar, which means that I can do short haircuts without a problem. But most importantly, I have thick new hair growth that has the same curl pattern as the rest of my hair. I am so pleased with the results that I am even trying cornrows, which is something I could not do before because I was afraid they would look weird on a receding hairline. All I can say is that the Heva team exceeded my expectations!

As a content creator, I have gotten so many rude comments about my high forehead that it got to the point that I was just hiding it. I tried different angles with my camera and even wore bangs at some point before moving on to wigs. But none of these did away with the fact that I was losing hair, and it was hurting my ability to be authentic with my audience. It took a lot of convincing for me to get the female hair transplant because, truth be told, I was afraid that I would end up with a man-like hairline. Worse still, I feared having the surgical look. My anxiety was very high when I arrived in Istanbul and met with my surgeon. We must have spent hours talking about my hairline and coming up with the curve. He did not rush me and understood why this was important to me, not just as a creator but also as a woman. I was a mess most of the time, but he was very gentle with me, and that helped me feel more comfortable. I love my new hairline and I have been sharing my journey with my followers because I know what it feels like to suffer in silence and want more women to know that their story can be different.

Growing up, I noticed that male pattern baldness ran in our family, and that honestly scared me. So, imagine my shock and agony when I started balding while in university. It started along my temples, and no sooner had the recession started than it picked up pace. It almost seemed like I had healthy hair one minute and was losing it the next. I was only 24 and in graduate school, but often, people would think I was much older. Sometimes, I even thought that other students thought I was the professor when I walked into the classes. I finally told my father about it. He’s always been okay with being bald, but he understood why I did not feel the same way, especially since I was still in school. He had gone bald in his thirties, so he had enjoyed some time with a full head of hair. He spoke to some of his friends, and they suggested that we get a hair transplant done in Turkey, and we settled on Heva. We both liked how professional they were in our communications, especially since they also arranged transport and accommodation for us as we came in from the UK. Since I had a Norwood 3 hair loss pattern, my surgeon decided to do an FUE hair transplant. He also explained the other techniques that were available so I could understand why this was the best option. To be honest, though, my father asked most of the questions. I was mainly there to fix my hairline, but I did pay attention when we were designing the curvature of the hairline and discussing the number of grafts. I did not want to come out with a hairline that betrayed my age as much as the receding temples had. The procedure was time-consuming but simple. The surgeon extracted and implanted 3,000 grafts throughout the hairline, making sure to pack for density. The hairline mapping was probably the best part about seeing the results. It made me look much younger and much better-looking. Since the surgeon told me it would stay this way for decades, I left the clinic already celebrating the fact that I would not be going bald any time soon. I just had my 11-month post-op check-in with them, and we are all pleased with the results. My hairline remains well-defined, and my hair has grown in full and dense. I know that I can now start shaving my hair, but I just want to grow it out for now and enjoy what the Heva team gave to me. Thank you!

People often said that my son, who has a full head of hair, had taken my hair. I would laugh, but I was beginning to think the same thing. As his hair grew longer, mine fell out, and soon enough, I started looking like more of his great uncle than father. Maybe I am exaggerating a bit, but it felt that way. My wife eventually got tired of all my whining, and she booked me an online appointment with Heva despite my protests. I am glad she did because a part of me had biases against hair transplants, and I did not want to be that guy getting one. But on speaking to the team and seeing how professionally they handled hair transplants, I realized that this was more of a medical procedure than purely cosmetic, and I was finally on board. We did a combination FUE hair transplant and a PRP hair treatment to deal with the thinning on the top of my head. Despite all the thinning, I still had a good donor area, and the surgeon was able to extract and transplant 4,200 grafts. He also did the PRP treatment before and after the implantation, which he said would maximize the survival of the grafts and minimize shock loss. I am now 18 months post-op, and while I do not have a teenager’s hairline, I have excellent coverage. I do PRP sessions every 6 months, and that helps a lot with supporting my hair health. Oh, and my son’s hair is still growing – it turns out the two were never connected!

My husband’s DHI hair transplant went so smoothly that it felt like we were on vacation. Our coordinator planned a multi-day itinerary for us that allowed my husband to have the procedure done and still left us with room to rest before we headed back to New Zealand. It included his pre-op appointments, the day of the hair transplant, the follow-up washes, and the checkups. For all these, we had hotel transfers which were part of the package, so all we had to do was be on time for the pickups, and a driver would take us where we needed to be. Our package also included an all-inclusive meal plan at the hotel, so we did not have to leave to go out to eat, as the hotel’s restaurant served different cuisines. By the time we traveled home, he was no longer red and could go back to work. We have one month to go before we hit month 6. So far, he has loved his progress as he has come a long way. He still has some patches in some places, but the surgeon assured us that uneven regrowth is normal and the density will increase in the coming months. I am very pleased with how they go about these procedures, especially for people like us who need help with transport and accommodation.

My friend and I decided to get hair transplants as 50th birthday presents, which we had been talking about for years. He had a Norwood 3 hair loss pattern with early thinning, and I was dealing with Norwood 5 hair loss at the front and the crown. I attribute it to my years as a restaurant manager. If you’ve never had to deal with waiters showing up late to work or head chefs throwing fits just before opening, have I got stories for you! Anyway, we talked to the surgeons at Heva, and I went with Dr. Seda for mine. I wanted to get the surgery done in one day, but I was worried that I did not have enough donor hair to cover all the gaps and would end up with thin hair across my head. She did a full assessment and told me that it was not possible to do a session with 6,000 grafts without having a thin look and depleting my donor area. Her advice was that we should focus on filling out the front and once that had taken, we could work on the crown. As much as this was disappointing, I appreciated her honesty because she was thinking about my future. We still got to do the session in one day, but with 4,000 grafts, and it worked. My hairline is looking fuller and I am not looking like I am 60, as I did a few months ago. I now look like my age, and I am eager to work on my crown next year, now that we saved enough donor hair for that second surgery.

I hated that I looked like a teenager and was constantly getting ID’d when I was out with my friends. I mean, I had some hair on my chin, but my cheeks were completely bare and it did not help that my family carries the baby face genes. So, I opted to get a beard transplant at Heva Clinic. My only concern was that I would end up looking red in the face, which would make it obvious that I had gotten a beard transplant. My surgeon was pretty great. He helped me come up with the beard design, as I did not have anything in mind, and then worked on implanting the grafts. We also did a SVF treatment to better the graft survival. As expected, I still got the redness I had seen in other people, but this was gone by day 4 and the scabbing stopped about a week later. It’s now month 7 and I am beginning to look like a grown man. I am never shaving this thing off.

Before you tell me that magic is not real, I will have you know that team Heva can work it. Here is the deal. I love looking good, and I pride myself on looking the part when I show up to work, the club, or any other place where I pull up. That comes with its costs. After years of doing these neat and tight hairstyles, I ruined my edges, and I had to wear a fro to hide the fact that my hairline was a complete mess. I knew I could fix it with a hair transplant, but I had to get it done by a pro who understood African hair. Otherwise, the surgeon would just kill the graft before it went in, which would be a waste of my money and time. I was not about to damage my hair even more, so as much as I trusted my surgeon, I walked in there with a mirror so I could see what they were doing at the back of my head. Yes, I was that patient who had to be part of the whole process, and I had no problem with letting the team know that I was watching them. They did not mind, and as I watched them work, I realized that they knew what they were doing and were very careful and gentle with the grafts and the placement. It was not like they were just filling in the gaps as they went. They were angling the hair and taking time with every implant. It’s not a surprise that my hairline came out looking brand new and professional. I cannot recommend these magicians enough. I am still admiring their handiwork.