Chicago newspaper July Article on Hair Loss 

Please note, some comments made by Dr. Virginia Fiedler are inaccurate.  We have highlighted them for you.

For men losing their hair, the bald truth is that the pharmaceutical industry hasn't come up with a magic bullet to help them--and experts say it's likely to be a long time before it does.

Hopes of the follicularly challenged were raised with the introduction in recent years of the first drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration as being able to regrow hair, or at least help retain hair.

Rogaine, also sold generically as minoxidil, is applied directly to the scalp. Propecia, generically known as Finasteride and introduced after Rogaine, is a pill.

These drugs, which both work primarily on the crown, or rear top, of the head, have had only limited success.

Talk of next-generation drugs, which flowed freely in the days after the first baldness medications were approved, has quieted.

''There are things that people have been looking at, but there's nothing imminently in the pipeline,'' said Dr. Virginia Fiedler, who heads the dermatology department at the University of Illinois Chicago Medical Center. [HairlossSucks Correction - Dutasteride is absolutely in the pipeline and has already outperformed both Rogaine and Propecia in 6 month clinical Trials]

Three years ago Fiedler's research helped lead to the latest advance. She helped prove that increasing the dose of minoxidil to a 5 percent solution from 2 percent safely increased its effectiveness. 

Still, Rogaine slows or stops hair loss in only 40 percent of men. About 33 percent experience some regrowth. Propecia has been shown to slow hair loss in 88 percent of patients, with about 66 percent growing some new hair. [HairlossSucks Correction - Propecia was shown to maintain hair count in 83% of patients]

Then there's the cost: $30 to $50 a month for the rest of your life because, if you stop, the hair you grew will wind up down the drain.

Meanwhile, many Internet sites are pushing a new treatment: adding Retinoic Acid, or Retin-A, to Rogaine. But Fiedler said that's a dead end. 

''I've done some double-blind studies, and we could not increase the effectiveness of minoxidil with Retin-A,'' she said. 

Hair transplants are another alternative. But they can be painful, and responsible cosmetic surgeons warn patients they'll never again have the hair they had as teenagers. Experts say gene therapy is another promising avenue, but it is many years away from practical use.

The research most likely to hit the next home run is going on in Europe, according to Fiedler and other experts. Researchers in Scotland and the Netherlands are looking into cloning dermal papilla cells, which surround the hair follicle. The idea is to take a few healthy dermal papilla cells from an area of the scalp where hair is growing, use DNA technology to clone thousands more, and then transplant the new cells via injection to bald spots. The process could be 10 years off.

[HairlossSucks Note - for the latest information on one of the most spoken of researchers of Dermal Papilla research and its relation to cloning of hair follicles, please see our Dr. Gho & the EHRS story in this month's newsletter].