Topical Retin A and Hair Transplantation?

Past use of Retin-A should have no impact on the success of your hair transplant. Especially since it does aid in the absorption of Rogaine. I have my patients do a pre-surgery Rogaine regimen to enhance the final outcome of surgery.

Retin A and hair transplant should not be an issue but you should consult with your doctor.  For some patients, Retin A and minoxidil can cause skin irritation and reaction but how it affects the transplanted hairs is not clear.  

Retin A has many interesting effects.  High dose retin A can alter healing, it can increase skin absorption, cause skin drying and irritation.  This is a very interesting question and I could not find an answer in the medical research.  The tretinoin family has been associated with hair growth and hair loss but for this particular situation no clear answer exists. 

The previous use of Retin-a will not alter the success of hair transplantion. However, because there can be a lot of manipulation to the donor area during surgery, I would recommend stopping the Retin-A (where applied to the scalp) for a full week prior to surgery. Of course, double check with your transplant surgeon to be sure he or she is in agreement.

Interestingly, Retin-a is occasionally used to help increase absorption of minoxidil in the scalp. It helps to increase the turnover rate of your cells thus sloughing off some of the top layers. For this reason it helps with anti-aging and can be a major benefit in terms of wrinkle reduction.

However we have less information about how it affects the absorption of minoxidil. Dr. Nia Terezakis did the seminal work showing use of minoxidil with tretinoin. Large controlled clinical trials have not been done to show whether there is a major difference from adding tretinoin.

 

Unless your hair is dependent upon the minoxidil, I would not advise using it. I would suggest that you speak with your surgeon.