Long Hair Transplant – Truth or Gimmick

4 October, 2021 | Hair Transplant | Author : Shveta Virmani

With more and more people relying on cosmetic surgeries to enhance their appearance according to their desires, some people are still often skeptical about hair transplantation. It’s not because of the surgeon’s experience or even the cost but the “How will I look after the procedure?” or “Will it even show results for my hair?”

This is where the long hair transplant steps into the picture. Instead of the traditional hair transplant surgery where the patient’s donor and recipient site are shaved for the collection and transfer of the implants, a long hair transplant keeps a larger portion of the hair intact during the transplantation instead of shaving it down.

It enables patients to get a better picture of their hair after the transplant. It also allows the surgeons to have better access to the angular placement of individual follicles.

This article will discuss everything there is to know about long hair transplants and if the procedure is worth your time and efforts.

Feel free to skip ahead if one topic catches your eye:

Takeaway

1. What is Long Hair Transplant?

Medlinks is one of the best hair transplant clinics in Delhi offering Long Hair Transplant. Given that the procedure is relatively new and refined, it isn’t surprising that not every clinic across India specializes in it.

If you are entirely new to the concept, a long hair transplant is a type of hair restorative procedure when the surgeons extract follicular units with long hair shafts measuring between 3-8 cm in length. This is different from the traditional, where the shafts generally measure less than 2mm.

The long hair transplant enables the patients to get an outlook into how their recipient site would look once the hair starts growing at a full-fledged rate in the future.

However, the implanted long shafts of hair will eventually fall out from the recipient site, following which the actual hair starts growing in its place around three months later.

Some of the crucial benefits to a long hair transplant include:

Reduced appearance of blood clots or incision site on the donor or recipient site, ensuring the better appearance of the patient post-surgery.
Better surgical precision at the angulation, direction, and density in the transplanted site on the scalp.
Immediate results with a very natural appearance, enabling patients to feel more comfortable undergoing surgery.
Depending on the patient’s hair density and results, one session of long hair transplant is often enough.

2. Techniques used for Performing Long Hair Transplant

Long hair transplant is gaining rapid popularity, and all for the right reasons. If you are considering undergoing a long hair transplant, be assured that your cosmetic surgeon will offer a few techniques to ensure a successful transplant.

FUE or Follicular Unit Extraction Long Hair Transplant

Since FUE is a more refined and recent hair transplant procedure with reduced scarring and precise implantation, it isn’t surprising that both surgeons and patients prefer this over FUT.

The FUE long hair transplant is also alternatively termed a non-shaving FUE transplant (NS-FUE). The primary difference of NS-FUE with the standard FUE procedure is that none of the hair in the donor area is shaved. The length of the hair shaft is kept intact while extracting and transplanting it to the recipient site on the scalp.

Steps of NS-FUE Transplant

Now that you have a basic idea about the FUE transplant, it is important to describe the steps involved:

As mentioned, this is a non-shaving procedure, which means that the patient’s hair from the donor site isn't shaved or trimmed down to a minimum as in the standard FUE transplant.
Once the whole donor area is scoped out, special FUE punches are required. In this, an individual punch follows a pattern of cutting through the long hair, cutting the skin, and then through the arrector pili muscle attachment.
Once done, the loose hair graft is then pulled out from the site using the jeweler’s forceps.
In some cases, the assisting surgical staff will pre-make the recipient site, and the grafts are immediately implanted into the recipient site to reduce the out-of-the-body time. The implants can either be done manually or using implanters.

What are the advantages of NS-FUE over FUT?

If you are considering a long hair transplant, we’d recommend focusing on the advantages to understand the procedure better and get the correct procedure done. Some of the notable benefits include:

Better precise transplantation of the grafts in the direction and angle of the natural hair.
Lack of patchy clusters or prolonged scarring around the scalp as seen in FUT and window trimming procedures.
Get an instant preview of how the hair would look once the new hair grows out of the grafts.
Reduced downtime of the out-of-the-body time of individual grafts.

Despite the patient being able to witness the “instant” results after the transplant, keep in mind that the long hair in the recipient site will eventually fall out to support the growth of new hair in its place.

Many patients have this question in mind,“Is long hair transplant possible after hair transplant?” And, to answer this, yes, it is possible. The patient just needs to ensure that they maintain enough buffer time between the two procedures to avoid complications.

Long hair transplant

3. Who is an Ideal Candidate for Long Hair Transplant?

Like a standard hair transplant procedure, any patient with the ideal health is considered a perfect candidate.

If you are considering a long hair transplant, here’s what your hair transplant surgeon will consider:

Vitality and health of individual hair follicles
General health of the patient
Past medical history to rule out any kinds of chronic bleeding disorders that can affect the recovery and healing

A long female hair transplant in Delhi is a highly tedious and challenging procedure. If you are considering undergoing it, we’d highly recommend that you consult an experienced surgeon with a reliable name in the field.

4. Recovery: Long Hair Transplant

The recovery period after a long hair transplant can take between two weeks to a month. The same depends on the patient’s general health and how well they follow the individual aftercare instructions.

Your surgeon will give you a complete rundown of what you need to do, what you need to avoid, and the prescription of medications that you need to take.

Following these can help rule out any risks of infections or permanent damage that many individuals often experience due to poor lifestyle choices and not taking the antibiotics as prescribed.

Any strenuous activities are out of the charts for at least 2-3 weeks after the surgery. Besides that, products with high chemical content are not ideal. So, stick to herbal products or natural cleansers that won’t inflict harsh impacts on the scalp or the recipient site.

5. Cost of Hair Transplant in Delhi

When it comes to the long hair transplant cost in Delhi, be assured that the cost is pretty much the same as a traditional FUE hair transplant.

The packages that are suggested at the hair transplant clinics are based on the per graft cost, the charges levied by the surgeon, to name a few.

Some of the common factors affecting the cost include:

Number of grafts required for the surgery
Charges of the clinic and the consulting surgeon doing the procedure
City you are getting the surgery in
Kind of facilities and equipment used in the clinic

Your surgeon will be able to give you a rough estimate about the cost after the first consultation. You can plan your further approach based on the same.

Take Away

Long hair transplant is gaining rapid popularity across India, especially across the metropolitan cities where patients want to have a clear picture of what their hair would look like after the transplant. The direct implantation of the “longer hair shafts” instead of the trimmed and shaved hair follicles makes it easier for the patient to estimate their future appearance after the surgery.

Medlinks is the best hair transplant clinic in Delhi, offering cutting-edge technology for higher levels of satisfaction and treatment standards for their patients.