Your hair questions answered

Posted on 22 November 2012

By Laura Twiggs
(This article appeared in Mediclinic Family magazine, Issue 8)

We’ve all had a bad hair day at some point in our lives. But did you know that much of your hair is actually dead? Or that anaemia or thyroid conditions can cause sudden hair loss?

There’s more to a hair than the shaft visibly growing out of your head, as each strand is made up of several parts. Hair goes through a three-phase life cycle: anagen (the active, growing stage), catagen (a short period of breaking down) and telogen (resting phase). About 10 % of all scalp hairs are in this last stage at any given time, preparing to be shed. We start to concern ourselves about our locks when we begin to notice that we’re losing more hair than usual.

What causes hair loss?
We lose about 100 to 150 hairs a day and it’s normal for this to accelerate as we grow older. There are many factors that can quicken hair loss and even baldness, either temporarily or permanently. The cause of irreversible hair loss, androgenic alopecia or male-pattern baldness, is mostly genetic, affecting both men and women. The hormone dihydrotestosterone (DHT) interacts with the genes responsible for hair loss, causing hair follicles to shrink and fall out faster than the body can create new ones, with hair becoming finer and thinner. This starts at the hairline and crown of the head, and usually doesn’t extend to whole-head baldness. Culprits of reversible or temporary hair loss include severe stress, nutritional changes, certain medications (this includes some oral contraceptives) and hormonal changes during pregnancy, puberty or menopause.

What is alopecia?
Alopecia areata usually begins as a coin-sized circle of baldness and grows back without treatment within six months. More rarely, a few patches appear at the same time. Alopecia totalis causes total baldness and can also affect eyebrows and beards. Alopecia areata is caused by an autoimmune condition, where the body attacks its own hair follicles and can be treated with steriod injections, immuno-suppressants or ultraviolet light therapy.

My daughter has a habit of pulling her hair out, what does this mean?
Trichotillomania is a medically diagnosable impulse-control behavioural disorder. Scalp rubbing and twisting, pulling or plucking of hair, including eyebrows and eyelashes, often without intent, lead to mild or severe hair loss. In some cases psychological help or psychiatric medication can relieve the condition.

What can I do if I’m going bald?
Androgenic alopecia can’t be cured, but it may be slowed or temporarily reversed through drugs that inhibit the body’s production of DHT (minoxidil and finasteride are the two most widely used). The only permanent solution is hair-transplant surgery.

Big-screen heart-throbs Bruce Willis, Vin Diesel and Samuel L Jackson, as well as local radio and TV personality Mark Pilgrim and President Jacob Zuma, all make hairlessness a trademark rather than something to hide. Local cricketer Jacques Kallis, Manchester United football star Wayne Rooney and Italian president Silvio Berlusconi have all opted for hair-transplant surgery.

Healthy hair tips
• Avoid chemical products, especially colour.
• Avoid tight ponytails, buns or tight plaits.
• Towel-dry hair with your head turned upside down to stimulate blood circulation to your scalp.
• Regularly wash hair in warm (not hot) water; deep-condition it, too.

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The information provided in this article was correct at the time of publishing. At Mediclinic we endeavour to provide our patients and readers with accurate and reliable information, which is why we continually review and update our content. However, due to the dynamic nature of clinical information and medicine, some information may from time to time become outdated prior to revision.