Castration, as a TEENAGER prevent hairloss? IF, it could then you could take drugs like Depro-provera, but STOP taking it as various intervals when you wanted to be able to have sex. For THAT matter might it not also be useful for reducing acne, and BHP (and possibly even prostate cancer)? Personally, as someone who went from being BUFF at 18 to HEAVILY BALDING at 20 (maybe those pig balls and Cybergenics I purchased from GNC to help me put on muscle were a BAD idea after all), this is something I might actually have considered.
Has there been an research on using Propecia, and Minoxidil to PREVENT hair loss in adolescents? Since, I know that I have a tendency for hair loss (the first in my family) maybe I could start my son on these products when he hits twelve or thirteen (he’s three now, but I don’t want HIM to have to go from having PIZZA face, to getting lots of dates back to being a geek all in about four years). As I said maybe Propecia might even help with acne since it is my understanding that acne is at least partially mediated by testoserone.
which brings up the question WHY can’t we edit our posts here? I participate in TWO other Vbulletin boards www.allnurses.com and http://swingersboard.swinglifestyle.com/ BOTH of those boards allow editing. Is it because this feature requires system rescources which may be in short supply around here?
http://www.swingersboard.com/ the other one IS NOT (at least I don’t think it is) Vbulletin based. Also, I was trying to ask if the reason for this might not be because the edit function takes up system resources which are in short supply here.
Whilst I’m here, I’d like to draw your attention to the capitalisation thing. Nothing wrong with it, so this is just IMO, but it makes reading your posts tough going (for me anyway). Again, not a flame or a junior mod thing.
There is very little research for hair-loss period in either of those drugs. Because neither was designed specifically to combat hair-loss. Propecia is just Proscar renamed (drug name Finasteride) which is a prostate drug. I forget what Minoxidil was originally for… I tried googling it but got nothing but sites selling it for hairless. Suffice it to say both chemicals were discovered to regrow hair as a side-effect of their original purpose.
Now, with that said, many people who have Male Pattern Baldness or notice hair thinning do start on a Propecia/Minoxidil treatment very early. As most clinical trials have shown Propecia/Minoxidil do very very poorly in actually REGROWING lost hair or revitilizing dead follicles. What Propecia/Minox are good for is slowing down, sometimes significantly, the rate of hairloss. However, with Propecia, its effectiveness tends to taper off after about 3-5 years.
Also, hairloss, especially MPD is more complex than simply DHT. Otherwise, Merck’s new prostate drug, Dutasteride, which combats a much broader spectrum of DHT than Finasteride would completely regrow lost hair. It doesn’t.
As to your castration question. There are anecdotal reports of balding men who have undergone the transgender process taking the full battery of female hormones as well as Propecia and have seen significant hair regrowth. So yeah, DHT plays a part, but not alone.
In short, cutting your nuts off might just leave you just as bald and a eunuch to boot.
In fairness, he did say chemical (not physical) castration.
IIRC Minoxidil was originally an anti-hypertensive drug, that is one that would help unconstrict the blood vessels and increase circulation. The hair “regrowth” was a reported side-effect.
Since starting hormone replacement, my hair loss has completely halted, and I have a few areas that now show peach fuzz that were completely hair-free (fortunately, my bald spots are small and easily concealed). The hair loss stopped as soon as I started estrogen; the regrowth seems to have mostly started when I started using spironolactone.
IIRC, spironolactone is a testosterone antagonist (it impairs the creation of testosterone entirely), rather than a dihydrotestosterone antagonist. Finasteride is a dihydrogentestosterone antagonist and works by blocking the conversion of testosterone to dihydrotestosterone. It’s therefore much more effective at cutting out all the of effects of the evil hormone, not just the ones that are activated by DHT. (It also makes you need to pee a lot: it’s also a potassium-sparing diuretic.)
took those drugs to try and regrow hair/or stop it’s loss. Other than possible gynocomastia (which could be ameliorated by weight training and a low calorie diet) and a reduced sex drive (maybe after all women also have a sex drive w/o very much testosterone, at least in theory if not in my actual experience). Of course, I am aware of the research which shows possible long term health consequences to estrogen replacement therapy in post menopausal women, however I am focusing on short, and intermediate term effects (plus I believe that increased CHD/neoplasm risk could be offset by caloric restriction and vegetarian diets)
Lots of people take finasteride for hair loss. As far as I know, the only people who take spironolactone for the same reason are also transsexual. Spironolactone is more commonly used to reduce unwanted body hair in women with excess testosterone.
I did use finasteride for about a yearl before starting hormone replacement. It seemed to at least slow the rate of hair loss, but not as much as estrogen replacement did.
I would never recommend estrogen supplements for a phenotypic male who wished to remain that way. I was just offering my anecdotal experience with antiandrogens and hair loss.