More Treatment Tips

There are different levels of improvement. As the hair often deteriorates without treatment with some hair conditions, slowing down the loss or stabilizing it might actually be an improvement (compared to what would occur without treatments). With minoxidil, for instance, data has shown that even if you don't see regrowth, the percentage deterioration in hair quantity is often much less than if you hadn't used it at all.

Of course, most people look for a slight improvement or, preferably, full regrowth from any treatment. There is always the possibility of curing your condition, however, depending on how long you have had the problem, you may have to look for an improvement that is between what your condition is now and what is was before you had the hair loss. Will this be enough to satisfy you? Time will tell. The longer you have had a hair-loss problem, the more difficult it may be for you to attain full regrowth.

Hair loss often happens six to sixteen weeks after the trigger has occurred, so any treatment needs to be given the same length of time. If you are not willing to give a treatment regimen at least three months (after which time you should be seeing early results), I suggest you don't start using it in the first place; it's not fair on the treatment, or on your wallet.

How long should you keep using a treatment that seems to work? Many hair-loss conditions can be viewed as chronic (long term) conditions and just like any other chronic condition, treatment needs to be long term, especially with genetic hair loss. Therefore, you may need to use a treatment regimen consistently for it to continue working. For instance, if your hair loss is caused by dietary reasons, then you need to make sure that you keep following your corrected diet.

Stick with it!

Treatment Tips

Once you find out why you are losing hair, you need to decide on what treatments to use, if any. If you look on the Internet, you'll find a host of different products promising to regrow your hair. Which one should you use? A lot of products are expensive versions of saw palmetto (an herb which helps to block the conversion of testosterone to DHT) or minoxidil (Rogaine), both of which you could probably get cheaper elsewhere.

It is important to realize that there is no 100 percent guarantee with any treatment; as no single treatment is available that will regrow everyone's hair. In fact, I would go so far as to say that if anyone offers a 100 percent guarantee, you should be extremely skeptical. This doesn't mean that there is no hope as there are many causes of hair loss. Depending on why your hair is falling out, there are many treatments that can improve your condition and regrow your hair. Sometimes you may need to change treatments or use more than one treatment to find the best combination for you. This is why it's important to find out what's causing your hair loss first.

So what treatments should you use? The answer largely depends on what is causing your hair loss. Generic treatments, which you can purchase at many beauty salons and pharmacists, are formulated to help everyone with hair loss. They may temporarily help the symptoms of your hair loss, but if you don't identify the root of the problem, you will not see long-term improvement. Many treatments will help a proportion of people, but you want to use what will help you specifically. So, after you have ascertained why your hair is falling out, you want to use a treatment regimen that will help all these factors.

Often, therefore, a multifaceted treatment is necessary to get the best results. The more treatments that you use that are orientated to your problems, the better the chance of improvement.

Hair Loss and Medication

Taking certain medicines can cause hair loss in some people while the same medicine may not cause hair loss in others. Stopping a certain medicine can also cause hair loss in some, but not in others. In addition, certain medications can cause hair fall the first time they are taken, but not subsequent times (once the body adjusts to the medicine, the hair loss stops), or they don't cause hair loss the first time but do subsequent times (possibly due to the medicine accumulating in your system).

Sound complicated?

It is difficult to categorically say that one particular medicine causes hair loss and another doesn't, as medicines can react differently in different people.

So what particular groups of medications have been reported to cause hair loss?

The most common ones are:

· Chemotherapy medications. These can cause temporary hair loss by stopping the hair growth almost immediately (called anagen effluvium). They can also produce changes in hair texture, hair type, and pigmentation.

· Antidepressants. In particular, lithium-based medicines can temporarily disturb the hair cycle and cause hair loss.

· Thyroid medicines. Both an underactive (hypothyroid) and an overactive {hyperthymic) condition can cause the hair to fall out, as can the initial use of a thyroid medicine. Often, when a person starts taking thyroid medicine, the physician will need to vary the dosage until the correct balance is found. Some people experience hair loss during this process, up until three to six months after the dosage has been stabilized.

· Oral contraceptive pill. Either stopping or starting the pill may cause hair cycle disturbances. Oral contraceptives can affect the hormone levels, which often control hair growth.

· Other groups of medicines. Other medicines that can cause hair loss include blood pressure medications (blood thinners and beta blockers); cholesterol medicines; medications for ulcers, gout, arthritis, and Parkinson's disease; and anticonvulsants (for epilepsy).

· Vitamins and supplements. Some of these can cause hair loss such as taking too much vitamin A (in excess of 25,000 IU per day) and taking excessive quantities of "natural" testosterone boosters.