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Male Pattern Baldness
@tim-2 -
Yes I don't disagree with that. Reduced blood flow could have many effects on a hair follicle including via affecting DHT levels.
Examples of scalp tension correlating with hairloss isn't strong evidence for it playing a primary role though. Do you know of any evidence of a strong correlation among a random sample of men and women with and without hairloss?
True. There was a forum thread somewhere with literally about 100 scalp tension patterns (from that same study with the pictures I linked above). It was very interesting - it showed the person's head, alongside their measured scalp tnesion pattern. I can't find it, but will keep looking...
Edit: think it was here... not sure, haven't read through to find the study https://www.hairlosstalk.com/interact/threads/involvement-of-mechanical-stress-in-androgenetic-alopecia-von-mises-2d-analysis-models.113276/page-5
But my point was more that: muscular tension in the ring of muscles surrounding the scalp (not the scalp itself) creates a restriction in blood flow to the galea aponeurotica above at the top of the head. And this is a key cause of the hair loss. I'm certain that the metabolic and hormonal environment is what leads to the tightness and the sluggish blood flow in the first place.
I believe this happens in both men AND women. However, men may be affected more because of inherently tighter scalp skins (different skull shapes between genders), and stronger perimeter muscles (leading to more vascular constriction in men than women), as well as lack of progesterone / protective hormones that women have.
I do not believe DHT in the follicle itself to be the cause of hair loss.. Otherwise, healthy, hyper-masculine, young men would all be walking around with no hair by age 21 - this does not happen typically... in fact, it is often the less stereotypically masculine men who are losing their hair at those young ages. I know there is talk of younger men having higher T:DHT ratios, and with age, the T:DHT ratio drops (i.e. more DHT in older men relative to younger), but I think this is bogus. Average testosterone levels are as low as they have ever been (approaching a 500 average in the US!) but hair loss is at an all time high. Men have become less masculine, not more.
If you read the botox study I linked (I also have a 1 hour video interview from Dr Brian Freund explaining his study and results, but cannot upload it anywhere due to copyright - it does not belong to me), you will see that men with significant hair loss managed to recover a good portion of their hair through the use of botox to the scalp perimeter muscles over c. 1 year, and NOTHING else. No DHT blockers, no steroidal compounds, no drugs, no special diets, nothing. Granted, only 80% responded, but the 20% that didn't respond had been bald for a long time already and had thick calcified scalp skin (a dead lawn).
Botoxing of scalp perimeter muscles will certainly not have reduced the person's DHT levels, so why the hair recovery? Attaching a couple more pictures from the study below.
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My guess: if this muscular tension can be relieved continually (forever), I don't see why hair loss would not be halted and even reversed ... that is, apart from cases where baldness has been present for a long period of time and calcification has occurred - people who are in the early stages of baldness should be able to greatly benefit from being able to relax these muscles. How to do that though, very difficult...
Uploaded files:
And oh wow - someone has just taken this theory and run with it!
I found this just now: https://botoxforhairloss.com/scienceofhairloss.html wasn't there last year when I came across the theory.
Again, not saying we should all go and get botox to the scalp perimeter muscles - but it works! And if it works, then the muscular tension theory has to make some sense.
Very interesting ! This increased relaxation is also achieved by red LED helmets I believe.
@andrew2 I wonder what the long term affect of atrophied muscles on the skull would be in old age. Very interesting read, and if it works, not super expensive.
"Over time, with enough use of Botox, the muscles will simply atrophy from disuse, as all muscles do. This will make them unable to pull on your scalp muscles in the future."
I read some of Roddy's ideas a long time ago.
I'm familiar with ideas about the relationship between the galea aponeurotica and hair loss.
Have you read Rob English's published paper?
I think it's pretty essential reading for this discussion, it covers all the concepts discussed recently. If you've already read it or you feel like reading it, please let me know what objections you have to his hypothesis (in which DHT plays a role in pattern hair loss).
Have you heard of Ervin Osvart?
He published a small book called Papilla Power and The Follicle Fallacy. His simple alleged hair growth method is based on an old book called Growing New Hair by Margo. I own both books.
Margo's method is to use a towel to rub the scalp. Osvart expands on this by also using boar bristle brushing.
I'm not sold on the towel method, I'm concerned about it making things worse but I like boar bristle brushing which may work in a similar way to derma rolling which is proven to cause regrowth.
I'm currently doing derma rolling, boar bristle brushing, neck and jaw massages, scalp pinching using both hands and scalp massages with a handheld rubber head massager.
Just thought I'd share that before the forum goes down.
Today I did a little bit of a dive into MPB. I ended up on a sort of funny list in which people tried to figure out what BENEFIT there could be to men balding. Evolutionary benefit or survival benefit. I also did a few searches to try to find out what seems to go along with the genetics for baldness.
A few neat ideas came up. For one thing, perhaps it had to do with being able to take in more sunlight. There have been a few posts about "what does sunlight do to VA?". It does appear that sunlight denatures VA. Several of us feel that our VA toxicity is "head oriented" causing things like vertigo. What if this is a way to get rid of or denature vitamin A in the HEAD?
I've seen some things linking baldness to higher IQ. It definitely seems like a caucasian thing (dark old Europe). Also they have linked stronger bones to baldness.
https://ggenereux.blog/discussion/topic/ouranias-log/?part=14#postid-30155
interesting post by Ourania about red light