Hello, I have been following this platform on Reddit for a long time, and now I finally had the opportunity to register on the site. Due to the noticeable thinning in my hair, I started using Avodart (Dutasteride) 0.5 mg in June 2023. My battle against hair loss began when I started using Avodart. In the beginning, or rather in the first years, I experienced some sexual side effects, but after that, my body got used to it. I did not develop any gynecomastia in my chest. The initial phase could be troublesome, but currently, there is no issue.
As for my hair, I did not have much of a problem with Norwood classification, but my hair hasn’t increased significantly either; the thinning is still there. I also completed about six months of military service, which I believe had an effect, but I was still using Avodart during that time. Due to a cutting mistake (because of some inexperienced barbers), I noticed a gap forming on the left middle top of my head for the first time. After returning home from the military, I went and shaved my head. I continue to use Avodart. I think my left temple is Norwood 1.5, while the other temple is just 1. When my hair is shaved and short, I can clearly see the thinning.
I still have no idea how long I will use Avodart or how effective it will be. Maybe for two years, it has only maintained my existing hair, and things could have been worse without it, but thanks to Avodart, I have preserved my hair. I continue using it. I am looking for suggestions on what I can do to further improve or thicken my hair.
minoxidil 5% (or low-dose-oral-minoxidil 2.5mg)+supplements (eg. biotin) is probably what you need, though consult a doctor first before taking any medications or supplements. you can fix your bald temples with a small hair transplant if meds don’t do the trick, but they will probably do the trick in thickening your hair.
if your hair loss is due to AGA and perhaps CTE yeah you need to take minoxidil to recover lost hairs. if it is some other TEMPORARY reason eg. TE then no. Biotin won’t do much alone by itself but it will be a nice supplement to support your hair growth in my opinion. I did not mention any other medicines, so ending this answer here. You can find my current stack in my profile. Bye!
you need to FIRST AND FOREMOST determine whether you have AGA, for which you probably need to see a derm first only then with derm’s advice I would advise you to take a minoxidil. For legal and ethical reasons I cannot give medical advices but topical minoxidil is the gold standard for regrowing lost hairs especially when combined with tretinoin or in liposomal (although liposomal is far more expensive) form. There is also an oral form of minoxidil but oral minoxidil used for AGA is off-label and is sometimes shortened to LDOM (low dose oral minoxidil). LDOM is typically 2.5mg-5mg for men and said to be more effective than that of topical, but since it is a hypertension medicine in higher doses eg 10-40mg, be careful using it. Conduct blood pressure, heartbeat and ecg, heart checks etc routinely.
Did you have any issues while using oral minoxidil? Also, you mentioned you’re using Avodart — what Norwood stage were you when you started using both?
1)I had no problem with oral minoxidil at 2.5mg, though keep in mind that I had obtained it from a compounding pharmacy in Istanbul locally in Turkey as there exists NO original oral minoxidil (loniten/lonolox etc.) in Turkey. You have to refer to an institution known as TEB (Turkish Pharmacists Association) and with relevant prescription (which is practically hard to do even if you got the papers) to bring it from Germany, which is crazy expensive even if all else is left aside due to exchange rates and the price per pill (1.25 euro per pill roughly for lonolox), expensive even for Germans who earn euros let alone for Turks. 2)I have no norwood-hamilton classification, I am a textbook diffuse thinner though my back scalp is unaffected so not DUPA but very probably diffuse thinning variant of AGA. I am NW0 but diffuse as hell. I began using avodart 32 (±1), and the LDOM (low-dose-ora-minoxidil) 30 (±2) days ago. So I am a month in roughly. I could not use topical as it was and still is crazy expensive and ran for only a week for diffuse thinning variants, the foam versions of topical (topical minoxidil) that run for a lot longer is not easy to find here unfortunately.
ps: I don’t trust indian versions of loniten/lonolox, you can obtain them but a)legal issues b)trust issues are the reasons I do not.
I also want to start oral minoxidil soon.
Have you noticed any effects?
Did you see an increase in hair?
And how long have you been taking oral minoxidil?
TL;DR no for any side effects, for increase in hair, definitely yes for beard but not yet for scalp hair, for 47 days rn. start low if possible if you are gonna start. don’t just hop on 5-7.5mg. 2.5mg is the sweet spot, though always refer to a dermatologist.
I had no shedding still but I assume the drug is working, as I began to take not of beard gains in the past week or so. It does NOT grow follicles out of thin hair, so pre-existing beard is same dude, with slight thickening only. But if you had follicles that could grow but did not for some purpose it would grow them significantly like it did in me, perhaps you may even get a rainforest. Don’t quit if you hop on it and see no shedding.If you have a kind of thinning where telogen hairs are scarce but existing hairs in anagen are thinning/thinned, then maybe it may not shed
ps:I have a weird type of AGA to be honest, nearly all hairs that I see on my scalp are in anagen phase though thinned due to DHT, and they don’t seem to shed at all, if minox ends up thickening them instead of shedding i might become a rare low-shed, good responder, given nice beard hypertrichosis I ended up getting. fingers crossed. so no shedding, does not mean the drug is not working. keep pushing, maybe increase the dose with a doctor’s advice to max safe dose, perhaps couple it with topical (refer to a doc and calculate the systemic exposure too) perhaps with tretinoin and I suppose it will work. if nothing works, at least you could say that you put up a fight. balding/shaving it off may be the end of many things like perhaps dating but it is not the end of the world, i said this when the aga was at its worst for me and say it now, balding=/=end of your life. even balding young.
ps:shedding of full vellus hairs don’t count as they can easily be misinterpreted as dust even if you can see them. unless clumpy and lot (eg 200+ vellus hairs per day). i don’t know whether i am shedding vellus hairs. what i mean by shedding is shedding hairs that entered telogen prematurely who don’t grow and thin. if follicles aren’t dormant yet (they never die except fibrosis-like cases, ignore what even doctors say otherwise pp405 would not have worked even in 1% of people.), and you began to lose it 1-3 years ago, then i suppose minox will make a good bang for your hair .
I switched the topical minoxidil as oral gave me sides. My bp was going from 120 to 150 systolic and from 78 to 97 diastolic. Also over 20 bpm per minutes of change I had recorded in heart rate and dropped the oral minoxidil (2.5mg) the same day. And for improvement, anything less than 6 months is too early to judge so cannot know. But I don’t think anything less than HT will cut it for me honestly, way tooooo much ground lost. Either pp405 or a hair transplant, minoxidil is a poor solution. Minoxidil is a trash drug imho and those who are upvoted on tressless are hyper-responders, fin/dut do their job well but minoxidil often does not cut it, the hard but real truth, looking back to my old forum posts makes me feel naive about expectations of minoxidil . Many of those who have it “bad” here are people whom I would envy, esp. in nw2-nw3.
Minoxidil (topical route) + tretinoin is better than minoxidil alone, though always see a doc before taking any meds. SULT1A1 upregulation + Increased minoxidil absorption.
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. Many of those who have it “bad” here are people whom I would envy, esp. in nw2-nw3.