This is a new thread to discuss 3 cases in which it seems rheumatroid arthritis drugs restored hair.
What is interesting about these 3 cases is that:
-
growth of hairs was over an area of scalp that he
previously been devoid of visible hair -
and the new density of new hair growth on the
scalp was equal to that on the areas of his scalp that were not subject to
balding. -
They were male pattern baldness sufferers
this is something that sounds like a complete cure. The ultimate goal we are after. And its been done 3 times on humans. Noone else acheived anything even margnaly close to this.
First two cases are on benoxaprofen.
Third is recent report of hlh user who reported that he regrew 3cm of slick bald frontal hairline loss to full density and teen like coverage while he was taking sulfasalazine.
The timeline for these incidents were 5-9 months of continuous oral drug intake to see the regrowth. The dosages of sulfasalazine was 3000mg a day.
I already posted 2 related threads where more information can be found:
benoxaprofen: http://www.hairsite.com/hair-loss/forum_entry-id-32535-page-0-category-1-order-last_answer.html
sulfasalazine and benoxaprofen: http://www.hairsite.com/hair-loss/board_entry-id-84934.html
Bellow here is a summary of my findings so far:
Both benoxaprofen an sulfasalazine have few things in common.
One is for almost sure. The drugs alone wont grow hair. I concluded this from the fact that plenty of ppl take the drugs, so if hair growth was common side effect, they would have noticed. The ultimate goal of this thread would be to find out what is the missing part that together with these drugs gave the users the pleasant side effect.
They have similar side effects (photosensitivity for example). Both are anti inflamatory drugs used to treat rheumatoic arthritis and similar diseases.
Theres also a study that says that misture of iron ions together with 5-aminolevulinic-acid 5ala (active component in sulfasalazine) grows hair in mice
And patent that shows growth in humans (although its not sure if these were male pattern baldness cases at all):
The regrowth in the patent is unusualy fast (4-7 weeks).
There is some minor evidence that arthritis has to do with some lack of some bone progenitor cells (and we know that hairloss has to do with lack of hair follicle progenitor cells as well)
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=progenitor+arthritis
Sulfasalazine is also used to reverse fibrosis.
We also speculated that it could be sunburn (the photosensitivity damage) + the drug that stimulates the new growth.
This is very weak hypothesis. To support it we only have a gefinitib guy case which somehow shows regrowth on areas exposed to sun (if he got sunburn from back to front). All in all, i consider this to be just speculation.
http://www.hairsite.com/hair-loss/forum_entry-id-33436.html
Although it should also be stated that the patent also suggests that opposite can be acheived (if too much of 5-ala together with photo stimulation is used, follicles can be damaged).
If we were to try topical mixture of 5-ala and iron ions or mixture based on the patents, we should probably first test it on areas where possible hairloss wont bother us (very back of our neck for example) to find out if its safe. Also both users of anti androgens and users who do not use antiandrogens at all should try to test this, because atm we dont know if that can interfere with the treatment.
Im sick of this disease. Lets try to crack this down.
Everyone who can contribute please do so. Everyone who knows anyone who is scientificaly interested or knows any hair loss site user who is especialy bright in science of hairloss, please notify them of this thread.
