Leave Your Hormones Alone

[vq0]

DHT is not the culprit in male pattern baldness. Fibrosis caused by something that DHT does to the cell results in the attack of the follicle by your immune system and is visible as miniaturization. Is it not entirely possible that the cycles of maintenance and shedding on hormonal suppresants like finasteride and dutasteride result from our bodies compensating for an increase in testosterone. Suppressing DHT is a quick fix for a lifelong condition and even the celebrated 5-year propecia study shows that hair will continue to deteriorate. Bodily DHT deprivation is not worth the costs and lacks benefit unless you have BPH.

The only way to stop the balding process dead in its tracks is to stop the inflammation of the hair follicle. Suppression of DHT is one way to do this but there are many others. Below I have listed proven anti-fibrosis substances. Feel free to add to the list and discuss those I have listed. If anyone has had success with these please say which product you attribute it to and the rest of your regimine as well.

Anti-inflammatories
Essential Fatty Acids (Flax Oil, others)
Garlic
Emu Oil

Anti-oxidants
SOD (topical Cu/Zn and internal gliSODin)
SOD mimetics (TEMPOL)
Circumin
Grape Seed Extract
Green Tea
Fruits and Veggies

Could an anti-fibrotic regimine in combination with topical spironolactone be more effective than one based on hormone reducing drugs. I think it can and with products like Graftcyte selling for $150 I think there are people in the pharmaceutical industry that know this and are keeping quiet.

 

[techprof]

wait till you become a Norwood 5 or more with finasteride or dutasteride (I did that).
get on finasteride or dutasteride or just face the reality.

 

[vq0]

were you on any kind of supplements to reverse follicular fibrosis?

 

[The Gardener]

If someone in the pharmaceutical industry knew this, why would they be keeping quiet?

I would think they would be selling it to make money?

 

[vq0]

many of the substances above are herbal or already pattented. The amount of money required to push propecia through FDA trials necessitates they make some money off of it. If merck had knowledge that SOD cured baldness but couldn't make money what do you think they would do?

 

[The Gardener]

If the substance were already patented as you say, I would think the patent owner would put through FDA trials and then recoup trial costs in the product cost.

If I were Merck, I would tell the patent owner or owners that their patented chemicals are effective in treating hairloss, and then give the patent owner a percentage of future revenues in exchange for allowing Merck the ability to sell the product as a hairloss treatment.

The hairloss treatment market is HUGE, I would suspect that men around the world probably spend tens or hundreds of millions on hairloss treatments and snake oils. If there truly were an effective solution to male pattern baldness (SOD or otherwise) I am sure there would be people jumping to market it.

 

[vq0]

what if merck were to merely delay the release of a treatment like SOD and milk propecia for what its worth?

 

[The Gardener]

That only works when the supply of a commodity is finite.

Business think in terms of return on assets and return on investment.

For example, Merck has to shell out X dollars per year to run a finasteride plant. If that same plant could produce a different treatment that would garner a much larger market share and much larger pool of patients, then would not producing this alternative drug be a preferential expenditure of the X dollars?

Additionally, I would think that Merck would want to expedite production of this new substance because of the existing patents. If, as you say, these alternative treatments are already patented then it would behoove Merck to get this product to market ASAP to get as much time to sell it under the protections of these existing patents, as they will expire over time.

I guess my general view on this is that when you have a market potential of several tens or perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars each year, and you have a product that caters to that market significantly better than any existing products, I would find it very hard to believe that good old fashioned capitalism would not connect the dots somehow and some way.

 

[vq0]

assuming they are inexpensive they would not make as much profit and therefore not make there investment back. There stock would drop and they would go bankrupt. Anyway this is not a business thread. I believe fibrosis is the key aspect of male pattern baldness and want some input.

 

[The Gardener]

Are you saying that people who suffer from male pattern baldness have follicles that are genetically more susceptible to getting fibrosis than the people who are not suffering from male pattern baldness?

And, I am not trying to argue with you, nor am I disagreeing on the basic issue that fibrosis is a part of the male pattern baldness chain. I am more feeling out your logic and trying to get a larger view on why you think that its the most important factor, as this is a new idea to me.

 

[vq0]

I think DHT exascerbates fibrosis. Cyclosporin works better to control alopecia than dutasteride because it stops the immune system. I think fibrosis is many times more important than whatever initiates it.

 

[Rage]

If I remember correctly, inflammation was only found in about 30% of people with male pattern baldness.

It smells as if there are two forms of male pattern baldness, one which is modulated by DHT effects on the follicular cells themselves, and the other by immune attack. Simply inhibiting "inflammation" (redness) does not prevent the release of "inflammatory factors" which is responsible for the proliferation of fibroblasts thus causing fibrosis.

Some products on that list can prevent this.. but you'll want an immune suppressant to be most effective - hydrocortisone.

 

[The Gardener]

That makes sense... both of the comments above. I see where you are coming from.

 

[vq0]

whether it is inflamation or not scarring of the follicle causes male pattern baldness. anti-oxidants and anti-inflamatories prevent scarring. Copper Peptides decrease existing scars.

 

[The Gardener]

Yes, maybe in theory, but do you really think topical copper peptides, as formulated now and "sphritzed" over ones head carry a potent enough punch to become the backbone of an male pattern baldness regimen?

 

[vq0]

not sprayed but applied with a dropper in combination with penetrating agents I think they are a good backbone. With spironolactone its even better. An anti-inflammatory such as flax oil and circumin for TGF downregulation would make an almost perfect routine in my opinion. In addition, dutasteride would stop all male pattern baldness but make you a woman. Thats my opinion and I was wondering if anyone has tried a purely anti-fibrotic approach on this forum.

 

[docj077]

To be honest, I've known this for quite a while, but there is a lot of research to dig through out there.

The problem is that you now have to figure out why the fibrosis occurs on the scalp and not on the rest of the body. It's obvious that DHT increases pro-fibrotic molecules and mediators in the scalp in men with male pattern baldness. The question that needs to be answered is, why does this not happen to all areas of the body that are exposed to androgens?

Only time will tell what the difference is and why the pro-growth signal goes from being mediated by IGF-1 to a growth inhibitory signal mediated by TGF-beta.

For right now, the only three potential reasons for a difference between androgen receptor downstream effects in the scalp and the rest of body is that there is either an underlying disease causing this problem (virus, bacteria, or fungus), the scalp is more sensitive to anti-growth and oxidant effects (secondary to sunburn or other damage), or the human scalp is adversely affected by the use of shampoos and other cleansers.

That's pretty much all I have right now.

 

[docj077]

not sprayed but applied with a dropper in combination with penetrating agents I think they are a good backbone. With spironolactone its even better. An anti-inflammatory such as flax oil and circumin for TGF downregulation would make an almost perfect routine in my opinion. In addition, dutasteride would stop all male pattern baldness but make you a woman. Thats my opinion and I was wondering if anyone has tried a purely anti-fibrotic approach on this forum.

You'd probably like to know that companies like Scios are developing TGF-beta receptor antagonists. Such a drug will be used for the prevention of kidney fibrosis, liver fibrosis, lung fibrosis, and heart failure/fibrosis secondary to an MI.

If the company ever developed a topical out of the drug, it would be the most potent anti-fibrotic for male pattern baldness to date. A good point to make is that once you remove pro-fibrotic signals from an area of fibrosis, the fibrosis typically begins to reverse.

 

[vq0]

could it be affecting other areas of the body such as cardiac muscle, hence the correlation between early onset male pattern baldness and heart disease or is it solely the scalp?

Also, do you think a circumin topical would be a good idea?

 

[The Gardener]

Would the use of a TGF-Beta receptor antagonist potentially have any negative consequences that would be ripple effects from it? Is this receptor used for any beneficial purpose?