The challenge of solving baldness has motivated scientists for centuries.
It is known that almost 2,000 years ago, the Greek physician Hippocrates – considered the father of modern medicine for being the first to separate his scientific observations from the religious beliefs that prevailed at the time – spent time observing how hair works, and testing ways to reverse its fall.
And although today we understand much better how the hair system works – in addition to understanding that baldness has various causes, from genetic to environmental -, still Many misconceptions persist about what causes hair loss.
Even Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, tried to solve baldness. Is easy to see why.
“Being bald is not necessarily a bad thing,” Carolyn Goh, a dermatologist specializing in hair loss and scalp disorders at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA), tells BBC Mundo.
At BBC Mundo we tell you three myths that Dr. Goh believes still persist about baldness.
Myth 1: The culprits are the mother’s genes
Surely you have heard in a meeting with friends or family that the genes that cause baldness come from the maternal side of the family.
The reality is much more complex than that.
In a 2017 study published in the UK journal PLOS Genetics, a group of British researchers claimed to have studied 52,000 men with hereditary baldness, and said they were able to identify at least 287 individual genes involved in the hair loss process.
Of those they managed to identify, at least 40 were related to the X chromosome – the one inherited from the mother – while the rest were scattered throughout the genome.
“It’s true that the strongest genes come from the mother’s family,” says Goh, “but since more than one gene causes baldness, cann come from either side. So it’s likely that he comes from both.”
The genes responsible for alopecia can come from either side of the family.
To understand why it is rare for women to lose their hair with age – unlike men – it is necessary to explain what scientists understand occurs in “androgenetic alopecia”, that is, hereditary.
According to Goh, the genes that have been identified as responsible for this type of alopecia cause an exaggerated sensitivity to an element present in testosterone, the male hormone. This is a phenomenon that can occur in both men and women, but with differences.
“Women don’t generally go bald. They usually lose a little hair from the crown of the head, and maybe a little at the temples. And this is probably because we don’t have as much testosterone as men, and we have more estrogens to balance it out.
Myth 2: Wearing caps or washing your hair a lot causes it to fall out
How many times do you wash your hair a week? Every day, three times a week? Do you wear caps or a hat all the time?
Probably none of these are the reasons why your hair is falling out, despite what they told you at the hairdresser.
“Surely if you see someone with a head covering, they are covering it because they are going bald, not the other way around,” says Dr. Goh jokingly.
And it is that in terms of the use of caps or hats, there is no evidence that it favors hair loss.
Both myths are related to something that is very true: the scalp is one of the oiliest areas of the skin.
“It is one of the greasy areas but not necessarily one of the most sensitive. In fact, fewer allergies are reported on the scalp than on other parts of the body,” says the expert.
As he says, if someone uses the right products, You shouldn’t have a problem washing your hair every day.
Carolyn Goh, MD, of the University of Los Angeles, California, suffers from alopecia areata, which occurs when the immune system attacks hair follicles.
Myth 3: There is no proven solution to hair loss
Currently, there are at least three clinically proven alternatives to combat baldness.
None of them guarantee 100% results, given the complex chemical and biological system involved in hair loss, but they can help slow it down or even reverse it.
Minoxidil: a compound sold in lotions and foams that are applied directly to the scalp. In some informal studies, promising results of regrowth of hair have been reported with low-dose oral capsules of minoxidil, but its use in this form has not yet been approved.
Finasteride:sand consumed orally. It was originally used as a treatment for a type of benign enlarged prostate, and now, in lower concentrations, to prevent hair loss.
Transplants:for example, hair follicles are removed from the part of the head where hair growth continues and inserted into the parts where there is no growth. The different transplant techniques have evolved a lot in recent years.
About this latest treatment, Dr. Goh believes there is a persistent misconception: “That hair transplants looked bad. Maybe in the past, but transplants today are really good,” she says.
Due to the level of precision the procedure requires (removing and inserting individual hair follicles), Goh recommends that the transplant be done by someone with a “good eye.”
Dr. Goh says it’s best not to skimp when it comes to getting a transplant.
“It has a lot of art. The surprising thing is that the follicle remembers how it grew before being transplanted [generalmente de la parte trasera de la cabeza]and grows in the new site”.
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