A surgical procedure to remove small portions of hair-bearing scalp and relocate them to a bald area on the head of a person. Hair transplants are usually performed as cosmetic surgery for the baldness that develops as a result of aging, hormonal changes, or from a family history of hair loss. Hair transplantation can also be used for baldness caused by traumatic injuries or burns. In almost all cases, hair transplantation requires a series of procedures.
A cosmetic surgery procedure where sections of hair-bearing scalp are excised and relocated to hairless regions to address alopecia, or baldness. A variety of techniques can be employed for this purpose.
Strip grafting is a procedure where a strip of skin and hair is harvested from a donor area, typically from the back of the scalp or behind the ears. This harvested hair and its follicles are then implanted into several small cuts made in the bald section, referred to as the recipient site. The procedure commonly takes between 60 to 90 minutes. The patient is given a mild sedative, and both the donor and recipient areas are numbed. The donor site usually recovers in around five days. Although the transplanted hairs shed soon after, new hair begins to grow from the follicles between three weeks to three months later.
Other transplant methods encompass punch grafting, where a punch is utilized to extract small bald sections of the scalp and replace them with hair-bearing areas; flap grafting, where flaps of hairy skin are elevated, rotated, and sewn to replace bald areas; and male pattern baldness reduction, a procedure that involves removing bald skin sections and stretching the neighboring areas of the scalp with hair to fill in the gaps.