It may not be what we want but hair loss is quite a normal bodily function. The causes are many and varied but one thing is for sure and that is untold millions of people of all sexes and ages are affected by it worldwide. Alopecia is the general medical term for hair loss of any type. The most common type of hair loss in men is genetic; known as male pattern baldness, it affects close to 95 percent of males.

What most people don’t know that is if your hair loss is only moderate, it may be that your eating habits are causing the problem and your diet needs to be assessed. Exposure to chemicals or cosmetics, hormonal imbalance, stress, anxiety and mental tension are some of the other causes. No matter what the reason, it is worth remembering that it is only if the hair follicles are damaged that can make the condition permanent. Often mistakenly thought to be a strictly male disease, women actually make up forty percent of American sufferers.

Hair loss is in fact more common with women as they age but it is often caused by a thyroid problem. By the age of sixty, four out of every ten women in the world will have experienced some loss. During and after a pregnancy is another time when women may experience a hair loss problem. If you always thought that patterned hereditary baldness was a male problem then you will be surprised to learn that in America approximately 30 million women also suffer from this condition.

The best solution if you have permanent hair loss is to have it surgically restored and although a relatively new treatment has achieved considerable success. The treatment uses a technique to transplant hair follicles from a healthy area of the scalp to an area where the follicles are dead. Hair transplants have become the most popular form of hair restoration treatment for men with the entire procedure done under local anesthetic and on an out-patient basis. Many women are now deciding on hair transplant surgery as a method to hide scarring cause by facelifts for example.

The best result you can go for is to try and recapture how you originally looked when you have hair transplant surgery and not attempt to change your appearance. For a person planning on having hair transplant surgery, all current health issues must be cleared up before any treatment can commence. While cosmetic surgery does include hair restoration as one of its sub-fields, this is a different form of cosmetic treatment available. Fortunately, the science of hair loss and hair restoration is constantly advancing, so if you do not respond to other medical treatments, surgical hair restoration may be the only truly permanent solution to baldness.

Those regarding hair transfer surgical operation often wonder if it will be a painful experience. Some individuals have a hard time thinking of somebody cutting their scalp, particularly if it is delicate. Some disagree on the pain associated with the hair transplant surgical procedure.

Many that have had hair transplant surgical process have compared it to a visit with the dentist. This is definitely something that can be painful at times and definitely is not very relaxing. There is some pain associated with the local anesthetic agent that is injected into the scalp before the hair transfer procedures. Anyone who has had a tooth pulled knows that, if the tooth is deadened properly, it is not the tooth-pulling that hurts, it is the needle going in with medicine to numb the tooth that is the real agony.

Essentially to follow the dental analogy, after the desensitizing wears off there is plenty of pain where the tooth was previously. There is pain after a hair transfer surgical process. There is generally some swelling when hair transfer surgical process is done and it could prevent you from going to work. Whatever people might say but that the pain experienced during hair transfer is not equal to that felt when removing a tooth. The pain from hair transplant is unquestionably less intense, and certain individuals don’t even experience pain, instead feeling just a little discomfort. If they experience pain, it is the amount of pain that they can get rid of with a few Tylenol pills.

On the other hand, some people who have had hair transfer procedures done do not feel that there is any pain required at all and they tolerate the shots of the local anesthetic as well. In fact they often watch TV or read magazines, being awake and alert the entire time. Years ago, bigger sections of the scalp were taken than they are today, making hair transfer surgical operation much less painful now. This needed more incisions to take out donor hair and insert that hair into the desired area of the scalp.

In the past, hair transplant surgical operation was considered to be very painful. Ask lots of questions when looking for a hair transfer surgeon, for not all physicians use the most modern methods. The latest hair transplant techniques that utilize donor graftings focus only on the follicle and ignore nearby tissue. The procedure is minimally intrusive now, so that no more of the scalp is troubled than is necessary,this cuts down substantially on the amount of pain experienced.

After all if a hair transplant is performed by an experinced operating surgeon then it will not be a very painful surgical procedure. A physician who is aware of the best method to administer the process will make it less painful and give you more positive outcomes as well.