How Hair Is Harvested for Grafting?

There are different methods for harvesting hair for transplantation to the bald spots on your head. However, only few are used today. Each method carries with it its own advantages and disadvantages.

After all, there’s not a perfect methods existent for hair transplantation as of yet. It may take a few more decades before the most efficient method for harvesting is developed.

1. Single Strip Harvesting

Single strip harvesting entails the removal of a single strip of hair from the donor himself. The single strip of hair can then be divided for easier transplantation or grafting, later on. The division is done under stereo-microscopic conditions. This allows doctors to have more control over the division of the single strip of live hair shafts and hair follicles.

The biggest problem with the harvesting of hair is the fact that you can damage the microscopic follicles during the movement of the hair follicles.

When doctors see everything on the microscopic level, the individual follicular units are preserved. Everything is intact even during the grafting procedure itself. This improves the health of hair shafts and the capacity of the graft to survive the grafting procedure.

Advantage Of Single Strip Harvesting

If everything is done by a competent hair surgeon, the single strip extraction could produce high yields of hair shafts and hair follicles. The scarring is minimized, as well. The recovery period for single strip extraction would only take 1 day or 2 days at most. There’s a bit of pain, but that would go away in 1 or 2 days, as well.

2. Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE)

Follicular unit extraction (FUE) focuses on the extraction of the actual follicular units, which increases the yield of the harvesting by ¼ of the original number of hairs during single strip extraction. The procedure itself has evolved to a point that the procedure has become completely non-invasive but with higher yields. The punch done on the scalp is less than 1 millimeter in diameter.

Unlike older punching methods, only 1 follicular unit is removed from the scalp during extraction. In addition, doctors would not be using a swiping technique, which harvest several hair shafts at once. This technique, while it sounds good throughout, has the probability of directly damaging the sensitive hair follicles.

The one-step technique uses a punch that is pushed into the skin tissue for about 5 mm. The entire graft is pulled out with one swift motion. The two-step technique, on the other hand, uses a cut that is 1 millimeter deep. The removal of the graft is done by going through the deeper structures that can be found in the skin itself.

Advantages Of Follicular Unit Extraction

One of the main advantages of using FUE or follicular unit extraction is that there is no scar to speak of; there is some minor scarring but you would only be able to tell it if you look very, very closely at the scalp. And by then, the scalp would have already re-grown the hair. In addition, there would be no sutures required nor will there be staples used during the entirety of the procedure.