Hey everyone, I’m about to have my second round of surgery with Dr. Armani on August 8th. This round will be FUE and will primarily focus on the crown area, although some frontal hairline touch up work is also likely (as you will see in the pictures I have posted). In my 13 month post op update, I have included a couple of pictures of me in Bodrum, Turkey. I had a blast and just came back from vacation. The barbers in Turkey were impressed by how natural my hair looked after I told them about the procedure. I told them because a) I am not shy about letting people know I had the procedure and b) the barbers had to be told to work around the scar. They asked me if the scar was due to brain surgery, and when I told them how the scar got there, they were impressed by the work . Here are the pictures:
Mr. Frodo, I am getting around 2000 grafts. Some of the grafts will go toward the front and some toward the crown. I’m here in Toronto. Surgery is set for tomorrow.
To answer the previous questions, I went with strip the first time around because it offered more grafts and was cheaper. While it is true that I already have a strip scar, I didn’t want to risk stretching it out even further with another strip surgery. Also, FUE is much less invasive and a lot less painful/bloody.
Speaking of which, I had the operation and now I’m just waking up (though I plan on sleeping some more). The FUE operation was a lot easier than the strip and a lot less painful, although it did take a long time just to get the grafts extracted (around 7 hours). I asked Dr. Armani what he thought my hairline’s density was prior to this second procedure, and he agreed that the left side was weaker than the right. He said the right side was around 70-80 cm^2 and the left side was more like 50-60. He put a lot of grafts in the front (approximately 1350), and he put around 600 grafts around the crown region. Dr. Armani was very professional and he answered all of my questions. We had conversations about Turkey and Italy during surgery. I did get quite nauseous when I got back to my hotel room, but sleep has helped get rid of that. The overall procedure lasted around 12 hours total. I will try to answer any questions you guys might have, and will also try to post some pictures soon. OH, and they shaved my head completely so I’m officially bald for the time being ;).
Guys, I have to say post operatively speaking, FUE is such a piece of cake. I am in no pain whatsoever, and my appetite is back. My swelling is mild, and everything is going great at this point. Even during surgery, there was virtually no pain. The only downfall is that FUE is time consuming (7 hours just to extract around 2000 grafts). Other than that, I highly advise people to go for FUE (unless they want to get megasessions done the first time around). Dr. Armani will probably be getting rid of strip soon since he said most of his patients now are FUE patients. I am ver pleased with Dr. Armani and his entire staff, and I’m pleased with my post-op health so far :). Can’t wait to see what the coming months have in store for me.
» Guys, I have to say post operatively speaking, FUE is such a piece of cake.
» I am in no pain whatsoever, and my appetite is back. My swelling is mild,
» and everything is going great at this point. Even during surgery, there
» was virtually no pain. The only downfall is that FUE is time consuming (7
» hours just to extract around 2000 grafts). Other than that, I highly
» advise people to go for FUE (unless they want to get megasessions done the
» first time around). Dr. Armani will probably be getting rid of strip soon
» since he said most of his patients now are FUE patients. I am ver pleased
» with Dr. Armani and his entire staff, and I’m pleased with my post-op
» health so far :). Can’t wait to see what the coming months have in store
» for me.
Great to read yet another patient to find FUE much much less invasive. You are now in a real position to compare both procedures, welcome to the club.
Seven hours to extract 2000 grafts is still a bit much, but this will surely change and the assistants and the extracting docs get more expierence.
Despite of what some want you to believe, FUE growth is no less than strip growth, of course providing both procedures are done correctly.
What prevents most docs to offer mega FUE is the fact that they will need to work more hours then before. But patients will bring about change in such that FUE is the only acceptable method of choice. Strip is not obsolete, but it will only be used in extreme cases where maximum number of harvestable grafts is required.
I agree that FUE will be used more often by doctors. I think Dr. Armani will probably get rid of strip. I mean which doctor wants to put their patients through pain and blood when they can obtain similar results from FUE? Plus, FUE costs slightly more so doctors will make more money off of it (until competition rises).
Here are my post op pictures from HT#2. The face pic, while crappy, was put up to show that my swelling is only mild at the moment. I am staying in Toronto for a week and will be getting daily washes at the Armani clinic. Hairsite, feel free to add these pictures to my diary. Thanks! =)
Great to hear more docs are dropping strip in favor of the patients.
BTW, the headband is not something we use. Maybe this is still a ‘strip’ routine. We see only light to medium swelling after FUE, eventhough we don’t use a headband. Heck we do not even require to sleep upright the first nights. No anti biotics are ever used in our clinic either and have had no infections to date, another FUE advantage.
We use aloe vera to help the skin and rogaine foam as aftercare, nothing more and no less
Muscleboy, your results are great although there is something a bit al quaeda about the pics with the bandana:-)
I don’t understand one thing. Why did you get even more grafts in the hairline when you are allready at 50-70fu/cm2 with stable transplanted grafts. Wouldn’t it be more sensible to save those for the future?
The hairline had some gaps…and the area right behind the hairline wasn’t that dense. If you look at the pictures carefully, the left side of my head is where most of the grafts were placed. This is because Dr. Armani said that that area only had 50-60 cm^2 (just as I thought, compared to the right side). Dr. Armani placed grafts where he thought they were necessary. He said that in the future, we can continue to add grafts to other areas via FUE. I asked him what he thought about my donor supply, and he said that I still have a lot more to use up. On a somewhat lighter note, here’s a picture of me trying to be all sexy:
looks good muscleboy…im postop 2 months after a 4300 strip with armani and im thinking of doing the same thing as u with more fue later on. my old hair is filling in nicely but im still waiting on the new follicles to come in…I think
I see some in the temples but i could just be crazy…hasnt been 2 months yet
Ninjaxin, you still have some great times ahead of you. Once the hairs start sprouting and growing month by month, you will start enjoying your result :). Obviously, one pass is probably never enough so going with FUE the second round is a great idea. You would be amazed at how much easier it is (despite the longer time).
Marco I know you mean no harm by making the joke about my bandage and a resemblance to Al Qaeda, but I don’t know if everyone will appreciate or understand that comment. Just be careful how you phrase things bud and everything will be fine :).
» Marco I know you mean no harm by making the joke about my bandage and a
» resemblance to Al Qaeda, but I don’t know if everyone will appreciate or
» understand that comment. Just be careful how you phrase things bud and
» everything will be fine :).
Yep point taken. You know I’m in the U.K and there it’s a diferent kind take on things sometimes. I lived in California for a while so I should have learnt to know the diferent bounderies. Over here there it wouldn’t be seen with political intent and would just mean that it makes you look street cred but sorry for that.
what percentage of your original strip grafts do you think grew…i’m worried they are so densely packed that maybe some of them won’t grow or that I might have killed some of them off by accident. i never bled from my scalp after the surgery so you might think i didnt lose a graft but who knows…when did your growth really start to accelerate?
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