Making Hair Transplant Scars Less Noticeable

Hair transplant procedures, like any other surgical procedure, leaves scars. However, under the right surgeon, scars can be minimized so that they are hardly noticeable at all.

 A skilled hair transplant surgeon can make incisions that are so tiny that the resulting scars are nearly invisible.

A skilled hair transplant surgeon carefully chooses the site where he will harvest donor tissue for the receptor sites (the areas of the head that are balding). The surgeon makes sure that he doesn't donor tissue that is more than a centimeter wide. This way the scalp can close and heal completely when it is sutured.

A hair transplant procedure that goes smoothly results in the patient having scars that are hardly noticeable even when he wears his hair very short. Scars from hair transplant surgeries typically are unsightly if the patient tends to have keloid scarring. Patients who have this problem require special treatment to reduce the scarring.

If, for instance, you decide to undergo a hair transplant procedure and you know you are tend to have keloid scarring, let your surgeon know. He'll then explain to you that you may likely end up with unsightly scars after the procedure. An honest surgeon will let lay out all the facts to you and give you time to decide if you want to go ahead with the procedure or if you'd rather not risk having the scars.

If you do decide to go ahead with the procedure, you and your surgeon can then discuss ways on how you can cover the resulting keloid scars. Your doctor may suggest that you wear hair a little longer than you normally would.

Aside from the patients who are genetically predisposed to keloid scars, there are patients whose scalp is so rubbery that it results to wide scars on the donor sites. Only about 5% of patients who undergo hair transplant surgery are either predisposed to keloid scarring or have rubbery skin.

Majority of hair transplant patients tend to come out of the surgery with barely noticeable scars. Surgeons are able to keep donor strips thin, and use a suturing technique known as double-layer closure technique to help the skin to heal properly. Basically, as long as you're in the hands of a skilled and experienced hair transplant surgeon, you have little reason to worry about surgical scars.

Scarring also occurs when surgeons do multiple hair transplant procedures. Every time a patient comes in for a hair transplant procedure, the surgeon has to take out a new donor strip tissue. Thus, if your hair loss problem is rather extensive, you may require several hair transplant sessions, and this naturally increases the scars you get.

There is, however, a hair transplant method to keep scars to just one thin line even though a patient requires several hair transplant sessions. This procedure has the surgeon taking the new donor strip tissue right above the previous scar. In this case, the previous scar is removed along with the new donor strip tissue. After harvesting, the wound is sutured back, and the area where the previous scar used to be and new cut is sewn back into one line.