Modern society is all about instant gratification and comfort. Today, anything you could ever want is just a mouse click away. Shopping, working and even dating can be done on a smartphone. So, it is no surprise that the speed of daily living has made society impatient and anxious in other facets of life. In this article, we will go over the timeline of a hair transplant.
Shedding Phase
Immediately following a hair transplant the scalp is typically pink with tiny scabs forming around the micro-incision sites. The tiny graft incision sites heal rapidly within 7-10 days. After surgery, the scalp may experience some minor swelling and redness.
Generally, the redness clears up and fades away after a few weeks, but can prolong for months in fair-skinned individuals. The majority of patients begin to shed their transplanted hair around the third to the fourth week following surgery. In rare cases, some of the transplanted hair will not shed and will continue to grow.
Initial Growth Phase
The majority of patients begin to see some slight growth around the third to the fourth month following hair transplant surgery. However, it is not uncommon for some patients to not see any growth until the fifth to sixth month after surgery.
Unfortunately, hair growth is a process that requires a little bit of faith and patience. Hair growth is measured by months and some patients may cause themselves unnecessary worry and panic by measuring their results daily.
In the beginning stages of hair growth, the hair is fine, wispy and colorless making it extremely difficult for some patients to detect or even notice.
Hair Growth and Maturation
Most patients begin to see noticeable hair growth around seven months after surgery. By this time most patients have grown a substantial amount of new hair. However, the hairs are not mature and will continue to grow in diameter for the next few months.
In some cases, patients may notice their hair appears wiry and frizzy. This is common and the hair will begin to straighten over time as the hair matures. By twelve months most patients have grown all of their transplanted hair.
However, even at twelve months some of the hairs have not fully matured and grown into their final state. At eighteen months all of the transplanted hair has matured and grown in diameter providing a fuller and thicker appearance to the hair transplant result.
Conclusion
While the idea of waiting sounds like something foreign to most prospective patients. It is important to understand the process of a hair follicles life cycle. There are three stages of a hair follicles life cycle the anagen (growth), catagen (transitional) and telogen (resting) phase.
When follicular units are transplanted they enter the telogen (resting) phase. The time it takes for new growth to appear varies from individual to individual, some patients see growth within a few months and others take almost a full year.
Sadly, there is no high-speed growth chip that one could download to make hair grow faster, but maybe in the future who knows.