Losing Grafts After Hair Transplant?

Question

I recognized 6 days after the surgery that the scabs looks like grafts. There are hairs with a white / brown bulb on the end.... as you can see on the picture. Now the problem is that nearly all scabs I have lost till now (day 10) looking like that. I sent a picture to my doktor and he answered me that he also thinkst that I ´m loosing grafts. So is this possible ... or am im losing only the dryed tip of the follicle?

Anil R. Shah, MD · Answer

Greetings,All techniques, including handheld FUE, strip technique, and ARTAS will have some transections or grafts which were damaged during harvest.  Our numbers (which we believe translates to most other hair centers) were around 35-50% transection rate with handheld FUE, 15% transection rate with strip surgery (due to location of bevel of knife along the whole periphery of strip), and less than 5% transection rate with ARTAS.  In my own transplant procedure, I had 1000 grafts harvested and 1 transection with harvest!!!  If a patient paid for 1000 grafts, does this mean they paid for 1000 harvest attempts or 1000 legitimate grafts.Best, Dr. Anil Shah

Jae Pak, MD · Answer

It may be grafts or it may be scabs.  If you are concerned please follow up with your doctor for an exam.You will have hair loss after surgery. You may have graft loss after surgery. Not all the grafts will take.  You won't really know until you see results in 6 to 12 months.

Tim Neavin, MD · Answer

Thanks for the photo.  It's tough to tell from the pic but the story sounds very familiar.  Scabs will fall off and the hair often follows.  The follicle is generally integrated into the scalp.  Thus, a hair coming out at this point doesn't mean that the follicle came out.  That's unusual.

Andrew P. Amunategui, MD · Answer

My apologies, but it is hard to tell on my computer the details of the photo.  It looks to me like this is scab (too large to be bulb) with hair shaft only.  It is possible, though unlikely,  that that many bulbs are attached.  This should be extremely unlikely in the hands of an experienced hair transplant surgeon.

Rashid M. Rashid, PhD, MD · Answer

You can loose just the shaft or the whole shaft and bulb after a transplant. Loosing the bulb is rare and it would be hard to know for sure before the 1 year mark. A lot of it depends on how good the technicians are at putting in the grafts. Also, how much supervision was going on i.e did the doctor observe and come in the room during the graft placement? How experienced are the technicians? Are the technicians in house or contracted/subcontractors? At this poing the only real option is to wait and see.

Losing Grafts After Hair Transplant?

Answers (5)