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Is it Safe?
Yes. Hair transplantation has a justified reputation as being very safe. Only a few patients experience minor side-effects such as initial swelling and temporary numbness in the transplanted area. Minor bruising is very uncommon.
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Is it Painful?
No. The procedure is carried out under local anesthetic and mild sedation (which makes you drowsy, but awake) so that virtually no discomfort is felt during the procedure. Mild analgesics are prescribed afterwards to relieve any minor discomfort felt over the 24-48 hours following the procedure. Ice packs may be used for the first 48 hours after the procedure to minimize mild swelling that may occur on day three that can last for a day or so.
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Are there any scars?
If you heal normally, you will be left with a pencil line scar in the lower scalp donor area, where the hair to be transplanted is harvested from. The donor area is closed with fine sutures and this forms into a pencil line scar. Your surrounding hair covers this area easily. Even your hairdresser will have trouble finding it! The graft sites in the upper scalp heal with almost no scarring. This may only be barely visible upon close inspection, if seen at all. In any case, any small scarring is effectively covered by the transplanted hairs.
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How Many Procedures are Required?
This depends on the size of the area to be treated and the density required. This will be discussed with you, at the initial consultation. It may be as little as one mega-session procedure. Some of our clients come back for a second, a third or even fourth procedure to further add density to their head or to replace any androgen sensitive hair (non-transplanted hair) that they lost in the months and years following the previous procedure.
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When Does the New Hair Appear?
After the procedure, small scabs or crusts form on the grafts. These protect the grafts. After 10-14 days, the crusts will flake off by themselves. At this time, most of the transplanted hair seen above the scalp will initially be shed. This is normal. The hair roots, however, or the follicles below the skin will produce new hairs after 8-12 weeks. Each graft, in general, will produce between 1 to 4 hairs. At first, only a few hairs are seen, but many hairs are growing beneath the skin and they will appear gradually during the first six months. The results are gradual, at first and then this is subtle, but very certain.
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When Should I Start Treatment?
Patients may have hair restoration surgery at any age. It is often better to start when you are not completely bald, so that you can use existing hair to camouflage the procedure. However, because hair loss tends to be both gradual and progressive, it is often unwise to start surgical treatment in a patient, who is very young. A second procedure usually can be done for a young patient, if he or she continues to lose pre-transplanted or the androgen sensitive hair. Medical treatments such as Finasteride and Minoxidil may be offered to men with mild to moderate hair loss to help preserve thinning hair in the crown.
Hair transplants can be used to fill-in the front hairline and thicken the front half of the scalp. Medical treatment can then be used to maintain hair behind the transplants and possibly enhance the long-term results of hair restoration surgery. The Canadian Institute of Hair and Scalp Specialists can design an individualized plan to fulfill your specific needs.
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How Do I Know if I am a good candidate?
An ideal candidate is someone with dense hair in the permanent fringe of hair-bearing scalp. A patient with light-coloured hair and pale skin (as opposed to dark hair and pale skin) may appear to have a denser look. Patients with very wavy curly hair may require fewer sessions than someone with straight hair. While hair transplants look very natural, the end result may not achieve the density or total coverage that you had when you were a teenager. Results can vary from patient to patient. At the initial consultation, which is always free, we will discuss your expectations with you.
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What Service is Provided after the Procedure?
Comprehensive notes are provided to each patient, at the completion of the procedure. In addition, a follow-up appointment will be made for the patient ten days after the procedure, when the sutures are to be removed. Further check-ups (at no additional cost) will be provided, as you require.
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Are there any Guarantees of Success?
YES! We are so confident of the skill and experience of our team and with our leading edge techniques that we guarantee to replace any transplanted graft at no charge, if it fails to produce hair after a reasonable time, provided adequate donor hair exists.
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Want More Information?
To get the complete picture on your hair loss condition, we encourage you to call our Clinic to schedule an appointment. These consultations are always informative, confidential, and obligation-free. Photographs of our results are available and if desired, we can arrange for you to meet some of our patients to see the results for yourself.
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