This week on Tuck Talk, we meet Dr. Pum, Dr. Kulkan , a specialist in hair transplant surgery and cosmetic surgery for over 16 years, who will share her knowledge about hair transplants. Doing it with a quack doctor risks a fatal bloodstream infection, taking medication, laser surgery, and root transplant surgery. Which method of hair transplantation is the most effective and safe? Is it true that hair reflects your internal health? Also, we will clarify misconceptions about hair: eating MSG beware of thinning hair, washing your hair every day makes your hair grow fast. Let’s find the answers together.
Normally, a person will lose about a hundred strands of hair. If more than this is lost, it is risky. How true is this?
Dr. Pum: It’s true. According to the theory, people can lose hair. Normally, the average is about 100 strands. But in reality, in some situations, it is not necessary to wait until the count reaches 100 strands. If there is also hair loss, hair loss in patches, hair loss with itching, scalp pain, it could be a disease.
If it falls out without pain or itchiness, is it normal? Did it fall out from combing, washing, or just rubbing it with your hand?
Dr. Pum: This is very good because most people don’t understand. When they go to the doctor and the doctor asks if their hair is falling out, they usually mean that it’s falling out because the hair roots have problems. Is it due to deterioration? Is it genetic baldness? Or is it because the hair is broken from all kinds of chemicals? Whether it’s heat, hair dye, hair straightening, hair curling, these all cause hair to fall out as well. If the hair is broken from these chemicals, the hair roots are not damaged. It’s the hair itself that may be brittle and break. When we comb it, it falls out. If it’s like this, the doctor will say that it’s okay. Your hair is still good. It will grow new hair to replace it.
Normally, I wash my hair every day and I don’t feel like it’s falling out much. But if I tie it up and wash it every 2 days, it will fall out more. Is this equivalent to 100 strands and 100 strands totaling 200 strands?
Dr. Pum: You could say it like this because when we don’t wash our hair, sometimes our hair falls out, but it’s still stuck in our hairstyle. Now we’ll know when we comb our hair out or when we wash our hair, we’ll see it fall out. For people who have this problem, if there’s a lot of hair falling out, sometimes we’ll have them count it and have the user try to collect the hair stuck in the pipe, put it in a bag, and count it every day, every day, and then see how much hair falls out. Compare it over 1-2 weeks like this. It’s also a way to diagnose it in one way.
At what age does a person’s hair become thick, black, and most beautiful?
Dr. Pum: During adolescence, from the time we enter reproductive age. Women start to have menstrual periods, men start to have a cracked voice. The hormones in the body will adjust to adolescence. Men will have more hair. The body will be like this until the age of 30, when it will start to deteriorate. That is, the cells may start to deteriorate.
Like Tak, my hair is most beautiful when I’m 40. Is that possible?
Dr. Pum: It’s possible, Tak. It depends on our genetics.
My hair that has started to thin, can it be regenerated or not? At what age? There is a matter of the hair cycle. Would you like the doctor to explain this?
Dr. Pum: From birth to death, there will be no more hair or hair roots. In theory, the average hair of us is around 100,000-150,000 strands. It will be this much from birth until we get older and die. It will gradually decrease and will not be regenerated. Therefore, when we see hair growing and falling out, it is a cycle. It alternates. During the lifespan of hair, it will be regenerated for an average of 4-6 years. Hair will continue to grow long and then it will enter a resting phase. The resting phase will last for about 3-4 months. Then it will return to the development phase or the new growth phase. This cycle continues for about 20 rounds.
Why does it seem like we have less hair as we age, even though it has its own cycle?
Dr. Pum: There are many factors that make this cycle spin faster, such as genetics, which we encounter the most. If we are very stressed in our lifestyle, lack of nutrition or not getting enough rest, our hair will be weak. Some people get sick often and have chronic diseases that require them to take a lot of medicine. For example, chemotherapy can cause hair loss, but it will grow back. But if we receive chemotherapy frequently,
My hair will gradually become weaker. My hair cycle will rotate faster. According to theory, we can have 20 cycles of hair, each cycle is about 4-6 years. Therefore, our head should be full of hair until we are 120 years old, which is when most people die, right? But sometimes it’s not like that. For some people, the hair roots rotate quickly from many factors. Therefore, for some people, by the age of 40, all of it is gone. The scalp starts to bald, things like that. It’s from genetics, from what?
Is there any warning that my scalp is starting to have problems and my hair is falling out?
Dr. Pum: Basically, if it is due to genetics, in men, it will first appear as an M-shaped fork, then after a while it will start to look like a fried egg. After that, the fried egg and fork will try to spread out to meet in the middle. In most women, it will start in the middle of the head, in a straight circle with a center parting. Then it will spread out to the sides until it becomes very thin.
Can hair loss indicate that we are currently not in good health? Maybe we are not eating enough protein. Does this have any effect?
Dr. Pum: It’s possible. Hair, fur, and nails are one thing that reflects our internal health. So if at any time we don’t take good care of our health, don’t get enough rest, don’t exercise, don’t eat enough, and don’t get much sun, we might lose some hair. Our bodies can change sunlight into vitamin D when the sun is in the morning or evening, because it’s quite dangerous during the day. You might go for a run in the morning before ten in the morning.
Does vitamin D affect my hair?
Dr. Pum: Yes, there is a lot. Let the body get sunlight to create vitamin D. Those who can’t get any sunlight can eat food and take vitamin supplements.
I would like the doctor to explain whether baldness is due to genetics or from hormones that will cause baldness?
Dr. Pum: Regarding genetic baldness, there are mainly 2 factors: genetics. This does not mean genetics from family members, but our own genetics that indicate that our hair roots have receptors for the male hormone, which we call DST. These receptors usually occur in the middle of our crown, except at the back of the head.
How can I treat hair loss, thinning hair, and baldness? What methods are there?
Dr. Pum: The first main thing is medicine. The second is low-energy laser. The third is hair transplant surgery or root transfer. Since genetics is something we can’t do anything about, we treat hormones instead. There are two main drugs. One is an anti-hormone. These will block the DST hormone that stimulates hair loss. This can slow down genetic hair loss and reduce hair loss. The second group is a group that helps expand blood vessels and extends the period of hair production.
Is it dangerous?
Dr. Pum: The side effects of anti-hormone drugs that we are mostly afraid of are sexual performance, which will reduce sexual desire.
Do I need a doctor’s prescription? And will the doctor tell me that it will reduce sexual performance?
Dr. Pum: Yes, I have to tell you, I have to inform you because it is a fairly large side effect. But it doesn’t happen to everyone. The average is about 7-15 percent, meaning that out of a hundred people, it doesn’t happen to everyone. But if we have a problem, we can stop taking the drug or change to a lotion drop. Most of the potency symptoms can return to normal.
Are there any side effects of vasodilators?
Dr. Pum: There are side effects as well. If it is in the form of eating, the main ones, found at 30 percent, are hair growing all over the body, facial hair will become more visible. From being fine hair with no color, little pigment, it will become thicker. Therefore, it looks like the face is dark as well.
Will sexual performance decrease?
Dr. Pum: This group of drugs will not affect sexual performance. However, there may be some fainting if we take a high dose or swelling because it can cause salt to become stagnant in the body.
Can these be used by both men and women?
Dr. Pum: Actually, we do not recommend taking this group of drugs for women because they will have a lot of hair. However, current research and studies support that women can use them in low doses, meaning small amounts.
How many hair transplant methods are there and how can it be treated?
Dr. Pum: Hair transplant surgery involves moving strong hair roots, which are mostly at the nape of our neck. They are strong and long-lived. Simply put, like a standing tree, they are moved from the back of our neck to the front, moved to be planted at the front hairline, in the middle of the head, in the area that is already sparse, already thin. There are 2 main methods of surgery. The first is to make an incision. The incision is a long incision, cutting the scalp. From this scalp, separate it into small hair roots and try to plant them back as quickly as possible. Otherwise, the cells will die.
What are the precautions or advantages and disadvantages?
Dr. Pum: The advantage is that it is our own natural hair. When it grows out, it is our own hair. We can bleach, curl, dye it, or do anything because it is our own hair.
Have you planted it wrong? After planting it, it died?
Dr. Pum: There are some. Not 100 percent, but the rate of increase is 95-99 percent. It is considered a lot.
Are there any other advantages and disadvantages?
Dr. Pum: It’s a surgery, so it hurts. You’ll need to inject anesthesia. There’s a wound that needs to be taken care of. In the long run, if we don’t take good care of it, or if we have genetics for baldness, our hair will fall out anyway.
Will it fall again?
Dr. Pum: Yes, the transplanted hair will last longer, but that doesn’t mean it will last forever. Mostly, hair from the nape of the neck has a lifespan of 60-70 years. However, in cases where some people’s genetics aren’t bad, some people get it transplanted at 60-70 years old. The hair at the nape of the neck is still very strong, which means that its lifespan may be longer than that.
Have you ever done any strange cases?
Dr. Pum: Move from the genitals to cover the scar on the back. He is a man, but he cannot use his own head hair.
You can move, but my face doesn’t look the same?
Dr. Pum: They are not the same. He has a job where he has to cut his hair very short. Therefore, if the hair is very short, sometimes the appearance is similar and does not look different.
Are there any cases where it’s not okay, where someone died due to poisoning or hair transplantation?
Dr. Pum : Hair transplantation is a skin-level surgery that is quite safe. In fact, there are almost no serious side effects. Very few. In our country, there have never been any reports. But in other countries, there should be cases where medical students died after undergoing hair transplantation because of severe infections in their bloodstream. There are about 2-3 cases worldwide, and all of them were performed by quack doctors and in medical facilities that were not properly licensed.
It’s like a hair salon, and the person who did it wasn’t a doctor, so they didn’t know how to clean it. But recently, there was another case where someone decided to end their own life because the results of the treatment weren’t what they expected. There were a lot of scars, and the direction of the hair wasn’t what it should have been. It became a lifelong scar. This is a foreigner who ended his own life because of disappointment in this way, which is because he went to a quack doctor.
Someone said that if you want your hair to grow fast you have to wash it every day?
Dr. Pum: It’s not related at all. You don’t need to wash your hair every day. Whether your hair grows fast or slow depends on your genetics. On average, it grows about 1 centimeter per month. Some people grow faster than that. But the second thing is from the inside, such as eating good food, getting enough protein and vitamins. It will make you healthy and your hair grow fast.
What are the foods and vitamins that will help strengthen our hair?
Dr. Pum: For me, the main thing is protein because 90 percent of our hair is protein. I would recommend meat because it has a more complete amino acid profile. However, if some people are not comfortable eating meat, such as some people with high blood fat, eating beef every day would be too much. They might switch to fish and eat other protein supplements. Vitamins from B1 to B12, all ABEKD vitamins, and zinc and iron are also important. Thai women are high in iron.
They say eating a lot of MSG will cause hair loss?
Dr. Pum: Actually, there is no research that says MSG is related. There is some research done on mice that says MSG may cause free radicals. It will cause cells to deteriorate, such as facial skin cells and hair root cells. But in clinical terms, there is no saying that eating a lot of MSG will cause hair loss. But it is possible that eating a lot of MSG and eating a lot of instant noodles may actually cause hair loss. Because eating only instant noodles causes a lack of other nutrients. It is not enough. There is a lot of sodium, but it does not cause hair loss. It makes the salt go crazy. It will swell. It has nothing to do with hair.
Does frequent hair coloring cause hair loss?
Dr. Pum: Frequent hair coloring makes our hair brittle and prone to breakage. The hair roots are not reached. Dyeing, bleaching, perming, and straightening do not reach the hair roots at all. It will be at the hair shaft. Now, if the hair is brittle and prone to breakage, when you comb it, the hair will fall out as well.
And do you wash your hair at night?
Dr. Pum: This one should be blown dry before going to bed. Sleeping with a wet head, first of all, the scalp will be damp, fungus will flare up and become dandruff. Second, you will catch a cold because the head is cold at night. Sometimes we haven’t washed the pillow stuffing for a long time, so we have to put it out to dry in the sun. You should blow dry your hair. You can use a cool or hot air blower, but make it dry.
