Prostaglandin D2 (PGD2)

Stem cell; cell based hair therapy
21

Jarjar, I agree with you in principle that you can prompt the DP cells to proliferate using outside stimuli like drugs. That is a long established fact, and that’s ultimately how most of these drugs work. Hair loss results proximately from a failure of DP cells to proliferate, and if they’re not induced to proliferate again (or if they’re not replaced), you will not regrow hair. Therefore, by inductive reasoning, they are the key to growing hair. That much is plainly obvious.

However, the problem is that drugs don’t work well enough or reliably enough in most people to make a huge cosmetic impact. When I see Norwood 6’s being RELIABLY transformed into Norwood 1’s by safe drugs, then I’ll get excited. These results from Swisstemple are far from that.

22

[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by roger_that[/postedby]
My point was that although that’s what the majority get, there are still hundreds if not thousands of anecdotal cases where people who are already significantly bald, do regain a considerable amount of hair.[/quote]

Nobody is denying that. but ultimately they’re not good enough, so it’s nice to see something that is working for someone. This guy tried all these things, had no temple regrowth, now is getting some degree of temple hair growth. I haven’t seen any regrowth with anything aside from the big 3.

[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by roger_that[/postedby]
And both you and Jarjar point to Swisstemple as if he’s some big archetype and model patient who will represent the response in everyone else who uses his regimen. [/quote]

I have never pointed to Swisstemples as if he is some big archetype or model patient. I don’t see where you’re getting that from. I merely said, he seems to be getting results, and I’m excited by that, nothing more, nothing less.

[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by roger_that[/postedby]
Why should we assume that? He is just a single data point. To make any kind of valid inferences, any scientist will tell you that you need a bit more than one data point.

After all the hype surrounding this guy, he’s still just one person, and these results most likely represent an anecdotal response specific to him.[/quote]

Again, I never made any assertion that this one person means that it would work on everyone, or that it would work on a great deal of people, so I’m not sure why you’re making out like I did.

[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by roger_that[/postedby]
That said, the results are still not objectively that good. People need to take the cotton out of their eyes and have another good, clear look at those photos.

Yes, part of the triangular bald area at the temples has filled in. But the hair that’s filled in is still FAR from original density. I would not be happy with those results for all the time and effort put into doing that. All the countless hours spent in front of the mirror.[/quote]

Nobody is claiming that it’s original density, but it’s the first time I’ve seen any degree of regrowth of any degree outside the ‘big 3’. To me that is exciting, I can understand why you’re cynical; but I am cautiously optimistic about it.

Everybody wants to see a double blind placebo trial with 20,000 patients that produces full reversal from to NW0 in 100% of patients in the treatment group, but that isn’t happening any time soon. There’s no need to be so negative about it, it may not be what you want, but what else is there to think about? There’s just loads of big biotech companies that give random sparse updates once a year if we’re lucky, normally with no pictures. There’s absolutely no harm waiting to see if his results progress further now, is there?

23

These results are more than normal/usual and they could be 100% within our individual reach.

Meanwhile the amazing NW#6-to-#1 transformation might still be a pipe dream 20 years from now for all we know. We’ve been in a “just needs a few more years” situation that appeared to be a pretty sure thing before.

We are not required to make a choice about which of these horses to bet on. It does not damage the odds for one method if we put some faith or hope in another one too.

IMO this guy’s temple regrowth is quite remarkable for what it is. It’s worth watching.

24

[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by cal[/postedby]
These results are more than normal/usual and they could be 100% within our individual reach.

Meanwhile the amazing NW#6-to-#1 transformation might still be a pipe dream 20 years from now for all we know. [/quote]

I don’t think so because if you look at what Sanford-Burnham and Dr. Takahashi are doing (his recent article), you’ll see that they are doing it now, just not on people’s heads yet.

Growing hair from stem cells is fundamentally different from using drugs. It’s a matter of getting a 1:1 ratio of output per input. I think researchers will reach a point soon where it will be guaranteed that if you inject cells according to a certain protocol, you will definitely see terminal hairs. No bets, no crapshoots, no uncertainty. No slathering stuff on your scalp for months and watching for just a few hairs to sprout. You go in, you get injections and the hairs WILL grow unless your scalp has been completely trashed with scar tissue and is a bad substrate. And the amount of hair you grow will be in perfect proprtion to the number of cells injected. It will be something like this: Cells in, hair out… Cells in, hair out.

To prove I’m not all pie-in-the-sky unrealistic about this, though, I do have some doubts and concerns. My big question is what the quality of the hairs will be. I think SB, Takahashi, etc. will be able to offer terminal hairs of normal thickness, but I can’t be sure that they will have normal direction and spacing, etc. That’s because orientation of follicles seems to be governed by sonewhat different signals in embryoligical development than the proliferation of stem cells and DP cells. Uncertain orientation might be a cosmetic problem for some picky people (personally, I wouldn’t care.) Potentially just that fact alone could hold up the approval process, and that wouldn’t be a good thing.

25

My understanding is Swisstemple is still using one or 2 of the big 3, and he’s just added Setipiprant to supplement his regimen. Funny, if he’s so sure the big 3 are worthless, why wouldn’t he stop them altogether? Correct me if I’m wrong, but he hasn’t done that. Who’s to say that some of the other drugs he’s using aren’t helping or augmenting the effect of the Seti?

26

If S/B is already producing similar regrowth, then why on earth isn’t Swiss just purchasing S/B’s treatment right now at his local pharmacy instead?

As for the big-3’s contribution, nobody else gets those results from the existing drugs alone. His regimen is doing something.

Following his experiments does not equal dismissing everything else.

27

[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by cal[/postedby]
If S/B is already producing similar regrowth, then why on earth isn’t Swiss just purchasing S/B’s treatment right now at his local pharmacy instead?

As for the big-3’s contribution, nobody else gets those results from the existing drugs alone. His regimen is doing something.

Following his experiments does not equal dismissing everything else.[/quote]

  1. Like every other serious MPB treatment, SB’s has to go through an extensive trials and review process with the FDA and other countries’ regulators. Plus, SB is a cell-based treatment, so you’ll never be able to buy it in a pharmacy, even after it is approved. You will have to get it from a doctor in a clinic.

  2. Yes, they certainly do. I have posted photos which are widely available all over the internet and those are just the tip of the iceberg. The problem is that even when hundreds or thousands get great results, MILLIONS are using the big 3 and even those hundreds or thousands who get great results are a tiny minority, so by word of mouth, many in the hair loss community have written them off by now. And I’m NOT saying they’re entirely wrong. That isn’t my point.

The point is, compared with those hundreds or thousands who have had good results (better than Swisstemple, in fact) with the big 3, Swisstemple still remains only one person – even if you think his results are super awesome ultra mega hyper fantastic. Until we have more data points than Swisstemple, it’s safest to assume the efficacy rate is more like the big 3 than something really “huuuuuuge”, as Donald Trump would say. :smiley:

28

[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by roger_that[/postedby]
My understanding is Swisstemple is still using one or 2 of the big 3, and he’s just added Setipiprant to supplement his regimen. Funny, if he’s so sure the big 3 are worthless, why wouldn’t he stop them altogether? Correct me if I’m wrong, but he hasn’t done that. Who’s to say that some of the other drugs he’s using aren’t helping or augmenting the effect of the Seti?[/quote]

I nor he said, or anyone else said the big 3 are worthless, what we said is that someone who has been on them for over 6 years who was only maintaining is now getting some degree of temple growth.

29

Some people in this forum doesn’t like to believe the things you don’t understand
Yes this guy using finasteride and nowdays duta but as we know cause many of us taking finasteride ,me too for years ,this temple regrowth can’t be from this medication the only we can say is
As he saying he doesn’t take minoxidil so maybe if he was in minoxidil could have some temple regrowth but we are not sure for this so judging from the photos this guy has something

30

No, this kind of result really isn’t so common. I have already explained why. It’s not the amount of new hair that makes a result impressive, not for the purposes of HM discussion.

What Swiss has regrown is probably not 100% unprecedented or anything. But it’s rare overall and it’s even rarer to see someone do it basically without the big-3. He is on the big-3, but as was already stated, his results from those had plateaued for a long time before starting his recent regimen. This kind of thing is normally the best-case result when someone first starts the big-3 after never using anything before.

Until there is a commercial product, it’s also safest to assume no HM solution is coming in the foreseeable future from Sanford-Burnam/etc.

But that’s not the attitude of this forum. We come here to discuss new & unproven things.

31

Roger there aren’t going to be clinical trials for Swisstemple’s method because a big part of Swisstemple’s method that got him to the point he is at is to use laser lamps or something like that. He’s trying to harness the power of the sun to cause cellular proliferation. No drug company is going to run this through clinical trials. He only very recently started using SETI. All of the hair regrowth he has gotten on his temples thus far is from other methods, such as laser lamps or something like that.

At this time I myself would not be interested in these laser light methods to prompt cellular proliferation. Will it work? If you do it right you might get excellent regrowth BUT you could also photo-age your skin. You could cause yourself major wrinkles to take over your head much sooner than your age. You could cause skin cancer.

The thing I want to do is (1) to try to produce the same cellular proliferation by way of a topical chemical or (2) to inject the cells themselves into the skin so I won’t have to cause cellular proliferation by any method.

  1. I figure my best chance near term for a chemical to cause cellular proliferation is Samumed’s phase 2 drug called SM04554.

  2. I figure my best chance to instead just have cells implanted is either iPS cells or S & B cells.

I think one of the above two treatment modes will revolutionize the hair loss treatment industry within the next 1 - 2 years. If it’s SM04554 then I will probably be able to get it right here in America in 2 years or so, and if it’s cell implantation I will probably be able to get that treatment in Asia in about 2 years or so. Either way I’m preparing.

I think we should send someone to the Hair Loss Congress to gather information. It’s a 3 or 4 day event so it’s best to send someone else who can be there to gather all of the information and share it with us so we don’t miss something important. We could send Desmond for $3,000 to $3,500 and he will record the entire event and he did it last year so he knows exactly what to do. The price of admission to the event alone is $850 to $1,185 and when I say it will cost $3,000 to $3,500 to send Desmond that includes the cost of admission to the event for all 4 days, hotel, and airfare to the event, plus some minor miscellaneous expenses. He would stay at the hotel where the event is taking place and that would facilitate him getting to the event each day in a timely manner.

Researchers should be close enough to a cure that it’s in our best interests to keep up with what they’re doing. If you just go to the Congress for one or two presentations then you may miss other important presentations. It’s best to send someone who will go to all of the presentations and record them all and share the information with us. Plus if you go yourself you will be spending perhaps $1,500 or so to get yourself there and stay in a hotel and pay your admission, but if we all chip in to pay Desmond’s way then we could all get this done for $50 or so each and he does a good job. He’ll bring back virtually all of the information presented. He takes pictures of the posters and stuff. He interviews researchers.

32

A few moderate sunburns in the same area are not going to age the hell out of your skin. Use your brain, don’t overdo it, and space them out a year or so apart. You won’t hurt yourself in any big way.

My sister has been getting painful peeling sunburns on her shoulders & nose out of carelessness at least a dozen times over the years. She’s in her 30s and not exactly looking like an old hag.

Besides, we’re not talking about burning your FACE here. This is scalp skin. That skin area spent the first 20+ years of your life covered with hair, and if you have your way it will eventually spend the rest of your life covered again. How much long term sun exposure do you expect it to be getting, in the lifetime sense? You will get a lot more lifetime sun exposure & sunburns on your scalp if you go too bald and need to shave down. Ask any bald guy and he will confirm that.

Ever since Follica and their patents appeared on the scene most of a decade ago, people have constantly been assuming, worrying, etc, that the “wounds” need to be some kind of deep bad terrible messy stuff. But all the evidence points on the contrary. It will probably take nothing more than minor superficial damage.

(Do we even know that it MUST be a sunburn at all, and mild dermabrasion won’t do the same thing? Dermabrasion is known to provoke new follicle production. Follica was getting pretty interested in that concept.)

It’s not going to be some kind of straight ratio where worse wounding = better hair growth. The wounding is just to provoke the body’s response. It’s just one factor of several. Scalp wounds alone do not regrow hair no matter how severe.

33

The thing about photo aging is that you may think it’s “just” sunburn, but it’s actually the UV light causing point mutations in the DNA which accumulate over time, like a collection of mistakes which grows and grows. This will affect the follicle cells too, like every other type of cell in the skin, and in time, will hobble the follicles’ ability to grow healthy hair – especially if you’re already prone to AA.

That’s why, yes, things like the laser comb will excite and stimulate the physiological reactions in your follicles short-term, and can promote a bit of hair growth, but it comes at a big long-term expense, as it can slowly and irreparably destroy tissues and follicles. Any time you blast cells with photons you are going to get point mutations in the DNA, so this light or radiation thing is a double edged sword.

Anyone think I’m exaggerating, take some physical chem and biochem courses.

34

I know how sun damage works.

Don’t tell me that 3 mild sunburns over the course of 3 years is reckless, and spending 10-20 years on Finasteride & getting thousands of HT grafts is safer.

As for any upcoming treatment with zero long term data . . . don’t tell me that isn’t risky either.

35

[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by cal[/postedby]
I know how sun damage works.

Don’t tell me that 3 mild sunburns over the course of 3 years is reckless, and spending 10-20 years on Finasteride & getting thousands of HT grafts is safer.

As for any upcoming treatment with zero long term data . . . don’t tell me that isn’t risky either.[/quote]

The problem is that the benefit of a sunburn in terms of stimulating hair growth is VERY short-lived.

It’s a trade-off between weak and transient benefit, and the downside of cell damage. For there to be a real benefit, the exposure would have to be fairly chronic. That’s why the laser comb prescribes daily use, not 3 times over 3 years.

36

[quote]The problem is that the benefit of a sunburn in terms of stimulating hair growth is VERY short-lived.

It’s a trade-off between weak and transient benefit, and the downside of cell damage. For there to be a real benefit, the exposure would have to be fairly chronic. That’s why the laser comb prescribes daily use, not 3 times over 3 years.[/quote]

We so,

completely,

DO NOT know that.

I gave myself a few mild abrasions on my hairline while screwing around with some topicals. This was probably 6-7 years ago. It never did much visible good at the time; in fact it was so little that I can’t even recall exactly what the “regimen” was anymore. But over time I have noticed that area has been slower to thin out than the other side ever since.

What if that is some indication of the long term effect? Then imagine the difference one sunburn wound might be making when the INITIAL regrowth is so much more obvious like in Swisstemples’ case.

Whether you like it or not, what this guy got on his temples IS pretty unprecedented. You have said there is no reason to get excited because it’s no better than the big 3. But then I might as well say the big 3 is useless because it’s no better than hair transplants. Same logic.

37

Cal, mechanical disruption of the tissues is not the same as photo-stimulation. Mechanical disruption (aka wounding) acts at the tissue and cellular level, whereas photo-stumulation also acts at the molecular level. Proof of this is that of the two, only photo-stimulation can mutate the DNA. Wounding tissues doesn’t mutate the DNA.

I don’t doubt that you may have seen slightly better long-term hair retention on the part of your scalp you wounded. But what you did is NOT the same as what Swisstemples did with the light or sunburning the skin. Two different things.

38

I know. Mechanical damage is not DNA damage.

But I’m not trying to argue that DNA damage is harmless. I’m trying to argue that the cost/benefit ratio of this might be very worth it.

Every sunburn counts, yeah. Every bald guy I know has gotten some sunburns on his exposed scalp too.

And I still think mechanical damage from abrasions alone might just do it.

Follica has studied this stuff plenty and they did human trials on dermabrasion.

Before them, Intercytex used dermabrasion in their human trials. I have always suspected that may have been responsible for the only growth they ever saw. They never controlled for that factor alone despite dermabrasion’s hair growth effects having been reported by doctors years earlier.

39

So you think that wounding alone can reliably grow hair?

I know this has been said before here, but doesn’t that get us back to the question, “If there was such an easy cure to hair loss available to everyone for so long, wouldn’t it have been discovered a long time ago?”

Assuming that somehow, this was missed over the many millennia of human existence, and only Cotsarelis was smart enough to discover it (and develop it through Follica), then where is it?

Oh, maybe Follica secretly knows that wounding alone (without adding any drugs) will grow back hair, but since they can’t make any money off the discovery of “wounding alone”, they’re holding the secret close to their chests, so that they can launch wounding plus some bogus drug, to be used largely as a placebo and lock in their market share, so they can sell the idea commercially as a monetizable “product”?

I don’t know, that kind of scenario just defies common sense.

Or maybe wounding DOES require a drug to realize its effects.

Then where is it? How much longer will it take for Follica to discover this wonderful drug that will somehow unleash the massive potential of tissue wounding?

It seems to me that when you look at this logically, there are only 2 possibilities, if wounding has some benefit:

  1. Wounding alone can cause major regrowth – EXTREMELY unlikely, so let’s just give up on this idea

or

  1. Wounding requires some chemical to realize its effects – MORE likely, but that still leaves us at square one: until and unless that compound is discovered, wounding is still no better than any other idea that doesn’t grow hair.
40

(slapping forehead)

No, no, no.

Not like THAT.

Wounding alone can cause all-new follicle formation. Dermatologists have reported this happening here & there for years. It’s true.

But wounding alone does not create much. Not enough to be very cosmetically useful. The only way we would ever be using it as a treatment option would be with chemical assistance (either systemic, topical, or both) to dramatically beef-up the results.

The Intercytex HM operation never got “much” regrowth. But they got a slight measurable result on their stage-1 clinical trials, which got second stage funded. Stage 2 basically didn’t improve on the results.