Body Hair Transplantation: Case Report of Successful Outcome
A 63-year-old male presented with extensive baldness. Further, he gave history of previous punch transplantation 18 years back, which had failed to give satisfactory results. Occipital scalp examination showed multiple punch scars and poor density, of only 41 follicular units/sq cm. He was counselled about the poor donor area on scalp and was advised against a transplantation. He was determined to have a transplantation and requested for body hair transplantation, as he had good body hair and had read about the procedure on internet. Detailed counselling was done about body hair transplantation, detailed history taken, general examination performed to rule out any contraindications for the surgery. Investigations including blood counts, sugar, liver and renal function tests, electrocardiogram were within normal limits. Informed consent was obtained and preoperative photography performed. A test graft session by FUE technique was performed to determine its feasibility with 400 units from chest []. The hairs showed satisfactory growth after 5 months and after detailed counselling, larger sessions were planned.\nInitially, the procedure was planned under local cream anaesthesia, using eutectic mixture of lignocaine and prilocaine. However, this proved inadequate in relieving intraoperative pain and it was therefore decided to use tumescent anaesthesia, which was administered as per standard guidelines.[] FUE was performed by using a automated extractor with 0.9-mm punches. Sessions were performed from different areas, such as chest and abdomen [], arms, and thighs on different dates as shown in . shows characters of body hair, such as density and length from different areas. Rate of transection during extraction from different body parts is shown in .\nExtracted grafts were kept in ringer lactate solution [] and then transplanted in to the frontal, parietal, and vertex scalp []. Donor sites healed quickly in 2 days []. The grafts started growing on recipient area from fourth month onwards and reached a length of 3–4 cms by 8 months []. shows length of the grafted hairs after transplantation in to scalp from different areas. Yield (ratio of hairs growing after transplantation and the number of grafted hairs) after grafting from different body areas is shown in .\nPatient was satisfied with the results. The patient has been followed up for a period of 24 months after the first session and 8 months after the last session. The patient’s appearance has altered so much that he has had to change his passport!