Alopecia (Hair Loss) as an Embarrassing Condition
While hair growth is a proper function of the organism that determines correct body functioning, hair loss, or alopecia, is a devastating health condition that serves the sign of underlying health problems and creates numerous inconveniences for both men and women.
The most common sign of the condition is the process of balding of certain areas. However, the causes and symptoms of the disease can vary greatly, depending on its type.
The condition can be of numerous forms, including:
- Female-pattern hair loss, which features hair thinning on the top of the head. Despite the exact reasons of female baldness have not been investigated yet, it is likely to occur in postmenopausal women;
- Male pattern baldness appears mainly in patients above 50 years old. The main peculiarity of the complication is receding hairline, thinning of the hair on the temples and crown and sometimes complete baldness. This type of baldness is hereditary, but it can also be provoked by hypersensitive hair follicles, related to excess amount of specific male hormone;
- Involutional alopecia serves a natural issue, which is characterized by gradual hair thinning and lost with age. The number of hairs decrease, while the remaining hairs appear to be shorter;
- Alopecia universal is a dangerous condition, which features complete falling out of hair. This medical impairment presupposes not only head hair, but also eyelashes, eyebrows, pubic hair and others;
- Scarring alopecia occurs as a result of inflammatory skin conditions and other disorders. Such medical problems frequently result in scars and other areas, which provide no opportunity for hair to grow or regenerate. Consequently, a patient loses hair forever;
- Alopecia areata occurs rather suddenly, while its impacts can be extremely drastic. The issue leads to patchy hair loss both in adults and children. Complete baldness can be the result of this disorder, though over 90% of people who face the problem managed to return their hair within a couple of years.
Symptoms and Causes
While the natural process of hair follicle growth cannot be explained by healthcare providers, they can single out other reasons of alopecia occurrence. Most commonly, the disorder appears as a result of such disorders as:
- Illness, stress or childbirth usually cause hair loss, but it is temporary;
- Fungal infection is a popular cause of hair loss;
- Hormone imbalances are, probably, crucial reasons of alopecia development. Abnormal ranges of androgens stimulate thinning of hairs and their further falling out;
- Genes play an incredible role in baldness appearance, since many types of the disorder are hereditary;
- Diet and other strict food restrictions can lead to the lack of vitamins inevitable for proper hair growth and lead to unwanted effects;
- Cosmetic procedures can contribute to hair thinning and other abnormalities associated with hair loss;
- Drugs, blood thinners, cancer medications, chemotherapy and numerous other drastic pharmaceutical can have hair loss as a temporary side effect;
- Autoimmune diseases can trigger alopecia areata, when hair will grow back after a while.
Ways to Prevent and Treat the Disorder
There are other causes of hair loss process, but the most important step here is to find a proper medication to prevent this process.
The innovative pharmaceutical market offers a range of revolutionary drugs to stop the so-called irreversible baldness processes and manage the complication.
Propecia (Finasteride) serves one of such drugs, which features an ability to warn testosterone conversion into dihydrotestosterone. As a result, the drug is widely appreciated as a remedy of pattern hair loss.
Propecia is aimed at male alopecia treatment only, so cannot be used by women and children. Contact your medical specialist if you want to administer the medication off label for other purposes.
Generally, Propecia has a positive impact on the baldness process in over 85% of cases, preventing complete hair loss and related inconveniences.