My friend Mike had this problem, too. I advise you to reduce the dose of your medication or, better yet, see a doctor. My friend became bald and depressed because he was taking some medicines. Is it worth it? To make him feel better, I took him to a hair transplant clinic in Miami: Google Maps . I paid all the expenses, and it made him happy. Some pills harm our health, but we can’t always predict them. If I ever have a health problem, I’d rather die than take medication. I’m serious.
So it has been about 3 months that I have been off of testosterone. I am still taking HCG mono therapy 300 iu EOD. I have not seen any hair come back at all. I’m not losing as much but still no growth. Why is that? Does this mean that I will never get my hair back at all? Why do cancer patients get there hair back after chemo or radiation vs when see one takes testosterone and stops why would your hair not come back?
What medication was your friend taking ?
So if my DHT level drops in theory shouldn’t my hair grow back?
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Results vary a lot on that one. You can look at before and afters on google. Some guys get amazing regrowth, some guys get some, some just maintain where they are, some lose ground even on finasteride.
I think the average is 10-15% regrowth. That takes about a year to see.
I’ve been on 1mg of finasteride for about a year. I’ve continued to lose my front hair line. No sides so I may up the dose next MD visit. I use minoxidil as well, that seems to save the crown of my head.
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Are you still on testosterone? Do you have any side effects from any of these meds?
There is little to no benefit in using more than 1 mg of finasteride for hair loss. It is also possible that using less of it would have almost as much impact as 1 mg.
Dutasteride, would likely get you more DHT reduction in you scalp though.
I use oral minoxidil at 2.5 mg/day, with 1 mg of Finasteride. No negative sides from either. Oral minoxidil needs to be taken responsibly though, as it is also a very powerful blood pressure med when used at higher dosages, but even at 2.5 mg/day it seems research suggests it is better than the topical version.
One of the issues with topical minoxidil is that only about 40% of people have enough of the enzyme that converts minoxidil into minoxidil sulfate (the active form of the drug) in their scalp to get good regrowth out of it. Even if you are not one of those lucky 40%, you may have enough enzyme to get stabilization out of it, and if not, you are still probably slowing down the loss. Oral minoxidil is processed by the liver, which has plenty of the enzyme. Almost everyone is a responder to the oral version.
You will likely get more facial and body hair with the oral version though.
Yes I am on TRT and I blast. At the doses I take them I don’t see any sides.
My TRT doc will prescribe whatever I ask in this area, he’s a good dude. I’ve been thinking of trying one of those online MD groups like Keeps, or another group that specializes specifically in the hair loss area. Has anyone tried one of those? Is oral minoxidil over the counter like the topical is now? Is dutasteride harsher side wise though? Thanks for the suggestion @mnben87
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I get my finasteride from Keeps. I like them so far. It is easy to get online with them. I buy the whole year worth of finasteride at a time from them to get a discount. IIRC, it runs me $240 a year.
No, it requires an Rx in the US. Dermatologists fairly commonly Rx it here for hair loss. I get it on the internet.
I can’t see it being over the counter TBH. It’s a strong BP med. They discovered it’s ability to regrow hair in the clinical trials, and made a topical version to be able to sell it over the counter. Someone would take too much and kill themselves with it if it was over the counter. It has an FDA black box warning on it.
I tell you all this stuff, because I don’t want to be that guy that says something is all great and you should try it, then have you get an adverse reaction. It needs to be a personal decision after a lot of research.
I believe that it can be taken safely if the dose is low enough. Men are generally dosed at 10-50 mg for BP. They may even start as low as 5 mg, but a full sized man is probably going to be somewhere in the 20-30 mg/day range after titration. I am comfortable with 2.5 mg/day, but since it is something you take indefinitely, I wouldn’t be comfortable with more than that.
It has a higher likelihood of negative side effects. IIRC, it is about twice as likely to get those negative side effects on Dutasteride.
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