Another quick update on my Folica experimenting

Stem cell; cell based hair therapy
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Background:

I did some hair waxing on the spots, then some pretty deep scalp dermabrasion 3 days later, then EGF-R inhibition with oral Leflunomide pills starting 3-4 days after that, and the EGF-R inhibition was continued for about 12 days.

I did basically a dupe of Folica’s absolute simplest patent, with only the most active ingredient being used, and no topicals whatsoever during the two weeks.

I’ve reached the 4-week mark from the original wounding date.

A few smaller spots were also wounded during the EGF-R inhibition, and they’re only at about week #3 right now.

Honestly I’m a little disappointed right now. I’ve had regrowth, but there was more happening during the first two weeks than the 3rd & 4th week. The first two weeks out of the gate were a bit more unexpectedly rewarding than lately.

I’m not putting up pics yet because I’ll just get crap over them if I did. The results are hardly visible at all. Nothing that Folica could ever dream of selling as a “cure for hair loss” right now. (I’m not saying this out of genuine disappointment yet, so much as just trying to keep us all on the same page about what I’m describing.)

– I can say without a doubt now that the most progress has come from the deepest-wounded areas. These are the areas where I went so deep it worried me at first. I didn’t actually hit blood & start scarring, but I got damn close to it. The skin turned deep red in the first couple of days after wounding. (Not just very pinkish compared to the rest of my skin, I’m talking literally brick-colored crimson red.)

– The results so far could still be just from the dermabrasion alone. I went deep, the early regrowth came up very quickly afterwards, and that’s mainly were the major results are. I wouldn’t be shocked if this is just from that process, and anything related to the EGF-R inhibition is still yet to come later.

– Having said that, just the dermabrasion seems to really regrow a little something. Not “cosmetically significant” or anything, but repeating it a bunch of times on the same area might gradually build up something more visible over a couple years. It’s no worse than the cost, effort, grow-out, and risk of our current HT options.

(We’re all ready to line up for thousands of dollars worth of injections from ICX as soon as they prove ANYTHING is being regrown from it, right? We say that we’re ready to pay to repeat the procedure round-after-round, until it starts to look decent . . . IMO it sounds a lot cheaper & easier to just start spending only hundreds of dollars doing round-after-round of regular dermabrasion right now.)

– I inhibited the EGF-R with Leflunomide, and this stuff doesn’t leave the body very quickly. Even taking some charcoal to kick it out, I’ll bet I ended up having the Leflunomide in my system another week after I discontinued taking the pills. I don’t know; this may push back my EGFR-caused results a little longer than the expected day #45 or whatever. It’s just the nature of the beast with oral Arava pills. (But continued EGF-R inhibition didn’t stop the cancer patient’s regrowth from sprouting so I’m not too worried about it overall.)

That’s the news.

I’ll probably post up again at about 45-50 days. Hopefully there will be some more progress by then.

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edit, you’ve answered my question in your original post lol :slight_smile: sorry

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cal, how many new terminal hairs have grown from the experiment? Also, did you pluck/wax vellus hair before experiment?

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I’d add one more question . Did you take any WNT antagonist ?

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As for the # of terminal hairs, I don’t know. I’m not growing a few lone free-standing thick terminal hairs, so much as a small field of tiny barely-terminal wispy hairs. (Which are probably not done thickening yet.)

And the area that I dermabraded was relatively large overall. Some of it bald skin, some of it still hairy, some of it abraded deeply and other areas thinly, etc. Including the lightest-done areas, it probably adds up to several square inches in total. So I’m evaluating all this stuff in pretty broad strokes. (Getting a few non-representative stray hairs somewhere isn’t gonna confuse my expectations this way.)

I’ve done absolutely nothing chemically other than the oral EGF-R inhibition and some oral Finasteride. Nothing directly on the WNT issue, no.

As for the waxing, I just did a basic round of waxing strips on the area. Probably didn’t get more than just the larger-diameter hairs. Probably left some vellus hairs. But I didn’t want the topical hair-remover to potentially do anything to the results, even 3 days beforehand. (Just wanted NO extra variables whatsoever, even at the expense of growth.)

I think I’m gonna wait until at least the 2-month mark before trying to decide whether or not I think the EGF-R experiment made a difference in the results.

The next thing I’m gonna try will probably be chemical hair remover first, then wounding DURING the EGF-R inhibition rather than before it, and then probably some topical Lithium Chloride on the area afterwards.

(I’m not necessarily saying I think my first experiment has been “wrong” and this second idea will be “right.” I’m just leaning towards this other plan next time as a general continuation of the experimenting.)

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» The next thing I’m gonna try will probably be chemical hair remover first,
» then wounding DURING the EGF-R inhibition rather than before it, and
» then probably some topical Lithium Chloride on the area afterwards.

I think the EGF-R inhibition ‘during’ may be a good idea. Every paper that I read on the mechanism of wound healing mentions that EGF has a profound effect on epithelization. So it doesn’t really make sense for us to wait until epithelzation is complete before inhibiting the EGF. In my upcoming session, starting Monday 1st Sept, I’m going to apply the tannic acid EGF inhibitor directly onto the wound. Tannic acid used to be used in burn treatments. The concentration has to be low as high levels can cause hepatic toxicity.
I would have had the tannic acid by now only UPS had the wrong address so it had already started on it’s merry journey back to Deutschland.
Good Luck Cal.
»

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If you put those results up and nobody knew what you used, they would not be any better and in fact much worse than a lot of standard treatments that are proven to work ie minox prop etc

hell when i first started thinning, when my dht was not really that built up yet, I used to regularly get great regrowth with ONLY VITAMINS, since some of the B vitamins are vaso dilators, such as NIACIN, which does the same thing as MInox although to a smaller degree

i will say though, that you have not waited long enough to notice significant results and that would be with any treatment, one month is simply not long enough

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– I inhibited the EGF-R with Leflunomide, and this stuff doesn’t leave the body very quickly. Even taking some charcoal to kick it out, I’ll bet I ended up having the Leflunomide in my system another week after I discontinued taking the pills. I don’t know; this may push back my EGFR-caused results a little longer than the expected day #45 or whatever. It’s just the nature of the beast with oral Arava pills. (But continued EGF-R inhibition didn’t stop the cancer patient’s regrowth from sprouting so I’m not too worried about it overall.)

Did anbody try doing something similiar but with the exception of taking the egf-r topically?

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Cal:

How did you know that the drug had not left your system in a week? Side effects?

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quote -

“If you put those results up and nobody knew what you used, they would not be any better and in fact much worse than a lot of standard treatments that are proven to work ie minox prop etc
”

And this is precisely what I’ve being freely saying, and why I haven’t put pics up so far.

I’m not trying to convert anyone else to this idea. I’m not even trying for ideal growth yet. I’m just doing an experiment to see if there’s any science behind Folica’s core idea.

Jtelecom -

That’s just the normal course of action with Leflunomide. And I had some slight stomach/bowel irritation while I was on it to convince me as well.

The research warns that if you’re on this stuff steadily for a while it actually might take several months for it to clear out on its own.

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cal,
IMHO, it would be a good idea to consider taking the leflunomide PO at least starting 4 days before the wound/peel/wax events and stop taking it the day of the highest/strongest trauma event, thus having the full effect and not taking the drug extra days. Maybe a simple topical fluid fusion protein (ie etanercept?? why not?) --or even triamcinolone acetonide??-- , just in case locally expressed de novo pyrimidine synth upregulation can be attacked that way, and just in case that would mater and test if such does show an improvement in the results.
Just a thought.
Peace :wink:
drcb

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» cal,
» IMHO, it would be a good idea to consider taking the leflunomide PO at
» least starting 4 days before the wound/peel/wax events and stop taking it
» the day of the highest/strongest trauma event, thus having the full effect
» and not taking the drug extra days.

Maybe a simple topical fluid fusion
» protein (ie etanercept?? why not?) --or even triamcinolone acetonide??-- ,
» just in case locally expressed de novo pyrimidine synth upregulation can be
» attacked that way, and just in case that would mater and test if such does
» show an improvement in the results.
» Just a thought.
» Peace :wink:
» drcb

on the way of benji’s post in the other thread .

imho immune system has to be dropped in some manner and is reasonable be on egf inibitor before wounding (from photo of regrowth cases ).

Cal (and every other who is trying ) your work is great .

I’m very interested in this kind of experiment but i’m in Europe and it’s not quite simple obtain the drugs (we’re in big trouble already with minox foam ,you could image with arava-like)

… we’re also trying to involve a dermatologist to make same attempts ( if we reach the point of course i’ll post … )

Please, if you have in mind to repeat, consider the options above.

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Thanks.

The next things I have in mind are a wound-during-EGFR-inhibition experiment, and then after that I’ll start trying to get ahold of an immunosuppressant of some sort to throw into the mix.

If Folica works, I’m committed to trying to nail it down as soon as I possibly can. I don’t care if it costs me several thousand dollars in failed attempts.

I’m not financially well-off or anything. But compared to taking Finasteride for decades and getting HTs, this does not feel like a bad risk and investment at all. I only have to get one attempt to work.

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» Thanks.
»
»
» The next things I have in mind are a wound-during-EGFR-inhibition
» experiment, and then after that I’ll start trying to get ahold of an
» immunosuppressant of some sort to throw into the mix.
»
»
»
» If Folica works, I’m committed to trying to nail it down as soon as I
» possibly can. I don’t care if it costs me several thousand dollars in
» failed attempts.
»
» I’m not financially well-off or anything. But compared to taking
» Finasteride for decades and getting HTs, this does not feel like a bad risk
» and investment at all. I only have to get one attempt to work.

Cal, maybe it will be a good idea to take some antibiotics while doing your experiment, I think what you are doing is fairly safe except that if the wound doesn’t heal properly, you may risk getting infection.

Good luck

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»Reading the patent again it claims that depilation before wounding resulted in an 11 fold increase in hair follicles over non-depilation! This is VERY interesting! Still waiting for that incompetent company to sort my tannic acid order out but I’m eager to start my next experiment. I’ll wax the hairs that have sprouted so far (both terminal and vellus) wait 3 days then wound. I shall apply tannic acid after depilation to get the EGF inhibition under way BEFORE the wounding.

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baccy, pics of your new hair ?

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» »Reading the patent again it claims that depilation before wounding
» resulted in an 11 fold increase in hair follicles over non-depilation! This
» is VERY interesting! Still waiting for that incompetent company to sort my
» tannic acid order out but I’m eager to start my next experiment. I’ll wax
» the hairs that have sprouted so far (both terminal and vellus) wait 3 days
» then wound. I shall apply tannic acid after depilation to get the EGF
» inhibition under way BEFORE the wounding.

another interesting thing is that one guy oh hlh reports hair growth in a scar tissue when retin-A was being applied

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» baccy, pics of your new hair ?

Like I’ve said, if can see my buddy who’s got a cam, I’ll take some pics but because there’s nothing cosmetically viable yet, I shave it clean when I go out without a hat. I’ve just shaved off a week’s growth (about 3mm) but I’ll have to grow it to that length again to depilate. If I can, I’ll post pics up but I’ll invariably get a load of bollocks from the more unsavoury denizens of the forum.

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» » baccy, pics of your new hair ?
»
» Like I’ve said, if can see my buddy who’s got a cam, I’ll take some pics
» but because there’s nothing cosmetically viable yet, I shave it clean when
» I go out without a hat. I’ve just shaved off a week’s growth (about 3mm)
» but I’ll have to grow it to that length again to depilate. If I can, I’ll
» post pics up but I’ll invariably get a load of bollocks from the more
» unsavoury denizens of the forum.

the most important thing is that something has grown, even if is not cosmetically acceptable, cause this is what you done in your home, researchers will certainly do it better, but the point is: works or not? if something has grown up on your head, it means that follica CAN work !

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» » » baccy, pics of your new hair ?
» »
» » Like I’ve said, if can see my buddy who’s got a cam, I’ll take some
» pics
» » but because there’s nothing cosmetically viable yet, I shave it clean
» when
» » I go out without a hat. I’ve just shaved off a week’s growth (about
» 3mm)
» » but I’ll have to grow it to that length again to depilate. If I can,
» I’ll
» » post pics up but I’ll invariably get a load of bollocks from the more
» » unsavoury denizens of the forum.
»
» the most important thing is that something has grown, even if is not
» cosmetically acceptable, cause this is what you done in your home,
» researchers will certainly do it better, but the point is: works or not? if
» something has grown up on your head, it means that follica CAN work !
Yeah, I am pretty certain Follica will work, a lot of people on different forums have observed results from wounding, needling, etc. And especially the story about the little kid that grew enormous amount of hair by severe wounding. So I really think they will get some results, I only hope they get great results, so that you can get any kind of coverage/density you want.