How to Stimulate Healthy Hair Growth

No one wants to begin losing their hair. But a lot of people who are in that position don’t like the idea of using hormone-based products such as finasteride to treat hair loss. They would prefer to go a more natural route if feasible. But is the more natural path feasible for baldness? Do nonhormonal products really do the trick?

There are a couple methods for encouraging hair growth that appear to work well. One is the product minoxidil. Minoxidil was initially employed as a blood pressure medicine; it was then discovered that minoxidil pills caused the undesired side effect of hair growth throughout the body. Due to this, minoxidil is usually applied topically and not taken in pill form. It encourages healthier hair growth as well as faster growth.

Another natural product that encourages hair growth is black castor oil. There are lots of hair products that have begun to use black castor oil in their formula because it contains particular nutrients that are easily absorbed by the hair and scalp.

You see, baldness is typically a mix of factors, and regularly, an unhealthy scalp is the root of poor hair growth. Black castor oil is reported to not only nourish the hair itself, but also the scalp. The scalp is a delicate region and can become unhealthy due to a lack of blood flow. Research has shown that absence of correct blood flow is at the root of a lot of baldness problems.

That’s the reason another compound, nitric oxide, has been demonstrated to be effective in treating some sorts of hair loss. Nitric oxide widens the veins and arteries and encourages more blood flow in the body. Greater blood flow means more nutritional elements which can considerably improve the health of the scalp.

Taking one or two of these three non-steroidal supplements might just do the job for you and help not only in growing healthier hair, but also boost the health of the scalp too.

If you are experiencing hair loss and wish to try a few of these approaches, check out minoxidil side effects and benefits first, as well as castor oil for hair growth.

Why Some Women Go Bald

Every year, hundreds of thousands of women — and some men — suffer from premature hair loss or pattern baldness. Here are the usual causes and what can be done to address the problem.

THYROID PROBLEMS

One of the roles of the thyroid gland is to regulate body processes, such as metabolism. A thyroid problem can affect the normal timing of the hair cycle. Usually, hair will ‘rest’ for three months before falling out. With a thyroid problem, this can be reduced to just a few weeks. The hair will also have a tendency to fall out sooner, before growing to a normal, reasonable length.

The good news is that once the thyroid problem has been treated (in the case of an underactive thyroid, this is usually with the hormone thyroxine) the hair loss is completely reversible.

CONTRACEPTIVE PILL

All oral contraceptives contain progestogens, synthetic hormones that produce similar effects to the natural hormone progesterone — needed to help prevent a fertilised egg being implanted.

Some of these progestogens are good for the hair; others less so. That’s because the progestogen used can have a male hormone–like effect on hair.

Women worried about hair loss, or who have a predisposition to genetic hair loss, should speak to their GP about choosing a hair-friendly pill which lowers testosterone to a degree.

The decline in oestrogen during menopause can cause male pattern baldness in women, as the testosterone in their bodies becomes more dominant.

BEING CHUBBY

Being overweight increases the risk of metabolic syndrome — essentially a precursor to type-2 diabetes. This is where insulin levels are higher than they should be.

The problem is that a high insulin level in women can trigger a higher testosterone level — and increase the risk of baldness.

STRESS

Stress can lead to a type of hair loss called telogen effluvium — forcing the hairs into the resting state before their time.

Chronic stress might also push the immune system into overdrive so that it makes white blood cells attack the hair follicles.

Chronic stress, associated with shock, is also linked to a specific form of hair loss, alopecia areata. The condition affects 2 per cent of the population. Treatment is available, although the condition often clears up itself.

Causal Factors of Female Baldness

A human hair grows for two to six years. At any one time, 90 per cent of our hair is growing, while the remainder is in a resting state (known as the telogen stage) for between two to six months, before it falls out.

The hair follicle itself then rests for three months before the whole process is repeated.

AUTUMN

Researchers found that women had the highest proportion of resting hairs in July — with the telogen state in most of them ending around 100 days later, from October onwards.

This pattern is thought to be evolutionary: the body holds on to hair to protect the scalp against the summer’s midday sun.

Autumn is not the only cause of unexpected hair loss.

Hair is an incredibly sensitive barometer. Hair cells are the second-fastest produced cells in the body (after bone marrow), so hair is often the first thing to suffer from any bodily upset. It can even forewarn you when there are no other symptoms of illness.

That’s because we don’t need our hair for survival, so if it’s a choice between your hair growing or keeping blood going to the vital organs, the former will suffer.

MEDICATION

A number of medications can trigger hair shedding. It is thought that drugs switch more hairs from the growing into the resting phase, and these hairs are then shed a few months later.

Certain prescriptions for acne are thought to cause unexpected hair loss in 16 per cent of people taking it.

Beta-blockers (for high blood pressure), anti-coagulant (blood-thinning) drugs, antidepressants and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs have also been linked with hair loss, although why isn’t clear. However, for blood-thinning drugs, it is probably a question of balancing how bad the hair loss is against the reason they are on the drug in the first place. Usually the drug wins.

IRON DEFICIENCY

In premenopausal women, lack of iron is the most common cause of hair loss. Most of the iron stored in the body is bound to ferritin — a protein which helps in the production of hair cells and guards against hair shedding.

The three main causes of iron deficiency are a lack of iron in the diet, heavy periods and childbirth (because of blood loss).

Shedding between 40 and 120 hairs a day is normal; if you’re shedding more than usual, ask your GP for an iron test as well as a ferritin test. The normal range for iron is between 2 and 150 nanograms per millilitre, but we need a level of at least 70 to get good, healthy hair growth.

So you may show up as fine on a test, yet there isn’t a sufficient store for hair growth. It’s worth having both ferritin and iron levels checked for anaemia, as this is a specific marker for female hair loss.

Iron deficiency can also be triggered by coeliac disease — an intolerance to gluten (a protein found in wheat, barley and rye). This affects the gut’s ability to absorb food properly, so the body lacks nutrients including iron.

The good news is that hair growth resumes once the coeliac disease has been diagnosed and treated.

Good food sources of iron are red meat, egg yolks and green, leafy vegetables. Vitamin C helps with the absorption of iron, so have a glass of orange juice when eating.

However, the tannins in tea can stop iron being absorbed properly, so don’t drink tea with meals or at the same time as taking iron supplements.

Frequently Asked Questions about Hair Systems

No discussion about treatments and remedies for hair loss and baldness can be complete without a mention of wigs or toupees. And there’s a reason. Besides obviously coughing up the obvious, that is, covering up a balding head, wigs also work at giving the wearer an easy solution. More often than not, they are also low on cost in terms of both availability and maintenance, as opposed to other hair loss solutions.

Wigs are things of the past now, only used in tasteless comedies and in flash-backs. The wigs of today are not called wigs. They are called hair pieces, hair solutions, hair systems and a host of other technical-sounding terms. The basic idea remains the same though. Human, animal or artificial hair, woven onto a net or other substratum, is worn to cover a bald or thinning spot.

Who?

Wigs go back thousands of years and have been used both to improve aesthetics and indicate rank. In some countries, the judiciary still sports powdered wigs.

Wig and toupees are still widely used in theatre and performing arts. Toupees are generally smaller than wigs. These are patches worn to cover a bald or thinning spot. People with conditions that cause hair fall and people undergoing chemotherapy for cancer also require wigs.

How?

As with hair extensions, adhesives may be used to harness the wig. Some wigs are to be simply worn like a cap. It is advisable to go to a stylist so he can blend the wig in. Very rarely do wigs look inconspicuous. To get a natural look, a skilled stylist is required and for that, you need to spend money. A wig can be woven into existing natural hair if enough of it remains. In this case, it would be called a hair weave.

Where?

The only place you would remember wigs being sold would be costume shops but these are not the ideal places to make your purchase. You will find wig shops but most will not look current enough to you. This is where modern ‘studios’ score. Be sure to do your research before you make your purchase. This feature aims to help you do precisely that.

How Much?

Some wigs come really cheap, but it won’t be far from looking like a dead raccoon on your head! You can get a decent wig that is custom-made for you. Some international trichology centres will provide you solutions that can be very pricey. These are essentially wigs but named more agreeably. Feedback has varied so far.

Some people feel that the same wig is being sold to you at an extra-ordinary mark-up. Others see value in going for something that seems to have some research behind it and is endorsed by famous people. Recently, one such company was asked to stop airing its ads in the UK as the country’s regulatory watchdog deemed it misleading. So, due diligence is called for.