Scalp Massages And Their Potential For Regrowth

[AnxiousAndy]

No hair loss regimen can be effective for mental issues.

What do you mean? I am already on medication for my mental health issues. I'm simply trying to find a regimen that will actually stop my hair loss and so far nothing has worked.

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

There is not evidence that the crunching sounds have anything to do with fibrosis or especially DHT. I have heard it is just trapped air essentially/CO2. Obviously minute amounts.

Where did you hear this? I've been unable to find much information on it aside from a few anecdotal experiences. The best assumption is that it's fibroptic tissue, the scalp is much thicker and hard to stretch in areas of balding but also after massaging for some months it becomes much softer and flexible, I've even noticed derma rolling is starting to become slightly more painful and draw more blood with less rolls. Trapped oxygen seems unlikely to me but I'd be happy to consider it if you provide a source.

edit. I forgot to add, in the days after derma rolling I also notice the crunching is considerably less, actually I just derma rolled yesterday and I can't even get the crunch to happen currently, I only normally do light massages after rolling but doing deeper ones yields no crunches.

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

I admit what I am doing is extreme and its not ideal, but I just really want to keep my hair. I gave up the battle for regrowth a while ago, I'd be happy to just maintain but so far that has proven unobtainable. Yeah I've read Bridgeburn's thread, I've actually posted quite a bit on it lol. I was on 2mg estrogen for 4 months about 2 months ago and unfortunately not even that helped, I was losing hair and growing boobs so I decided to get remove it from my regimen. The only thing I haven't tried yet is dutasteride but I'm scared will cause my hair loss to accelerate as finasteride did just that. I had pretty full temples prior to treatment but since finasteride they are completely bald now and hairline is going back. I have thought about hair systems, I think they look great actually.. But that's a last resort I'd much rather try and keep my own hair. These massages and dermarolling is pretty much my last chance to save my hair, nothing has helped at all yet.

Finasteride should delay the recession so it seems odd that you lost hair at the temples on finasteride, could be possible that using finasteride coincided with receding. Shedding is also common with some treatments, I've often heard that it's a good sign that you will be a good responder as all the unhealthy hairs fall out ready for the newer healthier ones to come through. Considering you already have some sexual dysfunction that's the main side effect of dutasteride out of the way so it seems like a good option. Personally I'd be on dutasteride right now if I didn't need to get a silly prescription for it. A good outlook is that you're in control of your hairloss, at any time you can simply get a hair system and immediately have a full recovery. It's good for your mindset reminding yourself that you have a good backup option that is immediate and available to you.

 

[AnxiousAndy]

Finasteride should delay the recession so it seems odd that you lost hair at the temples on finasteride, could be possible that using finasteride coincided with receding. Shedding is also common with some treatments, I've often heard that it's a good sign that you will be a good responder as all the unhealthy hairs fall out ready for the newer healthier ones to come through. Considering you already have some sexual dysfunction that's the main side effect of dutasteride out of the way so it seems like a good option. Personally I'd be on dutasteride right now if I didn't need to get a silly prescription for it. A good outlook is that you're in control of your hairloss, at any time you can simply get a hair system and immediately have a full recovery. It's good for your mindset reminding yourself that you have a good backup option that is immediate and available to you.

Yeah I guess I found a hair transplant clinic that sells topical dutasteride so I have messaged them to see if I can buy some. I'd like to have some sort of topical anti androgen in my regimen since I've got internal T/DHT covered!

 

[Armando Jose]

There is not evidence that the crunching sounds have anything to do with fibrosis or especially DHT. I have heard it is just trapped air essentially/CO2. Obviously minute amounts.

Crunching sounds, ... maybe crystalized sebum?

Demonstration of polarizable crystals in fresh comedonal extracts: sebum crystallizes
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15844629

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

Crunching sounds, ... maybe crystalized sebum?

Demonstration of polarizable crystals in fresh comedonal extracts: sebum crystallizes
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15844629

Could be a possibility, I remember having some of this on the outside of my scalp a few years ago, it's like little grains of sand. I also remember reading clogged sebum can build up in the scalp and harden causing hair loss. Scalp massages ensure you release any excess sebum so they are also helpful in that regard. I've been using a crafting knife to cut my hair and I notice this causes little white things to build up seemingly out of nowhere. I've just now realized that's actually sebum on the hair follicle.

 

[Armando Jose]

Great

 

[doudou]

Could be a possibility, I remember having some of this on the outside of my scalp a few years ago, it's like little grains of sand. I also remember reading clogged sebum can build up in the scalp and harden causing hair loss. Scalp massages ensure you release any excess sebum so they are also helpful in that regard. I've been using a crafting knife to cut my hair and I notice this causes little white things to build up seemingly out of nowhere. I've just now realized that's actually sebum on the hair follicle.

hey i'm really inspired by your story , i actually really believe in this theory, there's a guy who has a website on this there's many testimonials about scalp exercises and massages that he discovered and did regrew a lot of persons's hair , but he said that it takes a long time like at least 10 months or so to see benefits...unfortunately i can't afford his ebook.. i'm happy that i stumbled upon your story which makes believe more in this theory which is pretty logical in my opinion..would you be down to help me by giving me more details on how you did it ..can we get in touch for more guidance from you? it would mean the world for me ..you know how hard it is to go through it...respect

 

[doudou]

Could be a possibility, I remember having some of this on the outside of my scalp a few years ago, it's like little grains of sand. I also remember reading clogged sebum can build up in the scalp and harden causing hair loss. Scalp massages ensure you release any excess sebum so they are also helpful in that regard. I've been using a crafting knife to cut my hair and I notice this causes little white things to build up seemingly out of nowhere. I've just now realized that's actually sebum on the hair follicle.

how did you do the massages,is it more pinching or kneading? my scalp is so tight i can't seem to pinch it? how did you do?

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

how did you do the massages,is it more pinching or kneading? my scalp is so tight i can't seem to pinch it? how did you do?

It's more pinching and you won't be able to massage deeply for some weeks or months depending how tight your scalp is, after some time your scalp will be quite loose and pliable, I've attached a picture of me pinching my scalp. I'd be happy to answer any questions that you have, I'm a little busy right now but I'll be able to answer them later.

 

[doudou]

It's more pinching and you won't be able to massage deeply for some weeks or months depending how tight your scalp is, after some time your scalp will be quite loose and pliable, I've attached a picture of me pinching my scalp. I'd be happy to answer any questions that you have, I'm a little busy right now but I'll be able to answer them later.

oh waw you can pinch it that much! ok ,hope it will loosen up quickly ,how long do you do it and how often per day? another question when you started these exercices did it cause more shedding? and did your scalp get really sore for a while like it's bruised ? coz it happened to me especially on the vertex area? btw how do you massage the vertex ? my scalp there seem really thick but tender is it normal?
thanks for your response i appreciate it

 

[Heinrich Harrer]

It's more pinching and you won't be able to massage deeply for some weeks or months depending how tight your scalp is, after some time your scalp will be quite loose and pliable, I've attached a picture of me pinching my scalp. I'd be happy to answer any questions that you have, I'm a little busy right now but I'll be able to answer them later.

Were you able to pinch this much in the beginning? I think you should make a small video on how you massage each area of the scalp. This is a delicate matter, a small mistake can render the entire process useless. If you used a vibrating / massage machine it would be a bit easier I suppose.

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

oh waw you can pinch it that much! ok ,hope it will loosen up quickly ,how long do you do it and how often per day? another question when you started these exercices did it cause more shedding? and did your scalp get really sore for a while like it's bruised ? coz it happened to me especially on the vertex area? btw how do you massage the vertex ? my scalp there seem really thick but tender is it normal?
thanks for your response i appreciate it

Yeah sadly there was some initial shedding and my hair loss seemed even worse but it grew back rather quickly, generally you will lose the weaker hairs that were about to fall out anyways and stronger thicker ones should take their place eventually. My scalp has gotten sore from time to time although it's nothing too major, generally it's sore if I massage vigorously in the days after derma rolling. The vertex was actually too hard for me to massage initially as it was quite hard to get a grip so I primarily massaged the front focusing more on the hairline, eventually I noticed my entire scalp had become looser and more pliable and I was actually able to get a grip on the vertex to massage it.

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

Were you able to pinch this much in the beginning? I think you should make a small video on how you massage each area of the scalp. This is a delicate matter, a small mistake can render the entire process useless. If you used a vibrating / massage machine it would be a bit easier I suppose.

No, if I recall correctly I wasn't able to pinch it with two fingers anywhere on the scalp. I had to use both hands and forcefully pinch my scalp. I originally took some videos to show my levels of hairloss for comparison but I didn't know how to anonymize my face in a video effectively. That video I linked in the post is probably the closest thing, I tend to experiment around a bit though. Generally you want to cause acute inflammation for the healing process and loosen the scalp up to stop chronic inflammation causing fibrosis to build up.

 

[mryellowman]

Yeah like others said a video would be very helpful. Because that pinch looks extraordinary. I usually massage like this : gather my hands together on my donor area and moving them up and down for 3 mins. Then i place my hands to the sides of my scalp above the ears and moving up and down for 3 mins. And then lastly gathering together on my vertex and moving up and down for 5 mins.

My scalp moves quite a bit actually but no way i can pinch my scalp like yours.

 

[Splatt]

First off I've been testing scalp massages as a way to promote hair growth, this method seems to be frowned upon and even ridiculed in some hairloss discussion sites. As you look into the mainstream hypothesis massages look less and less likely to do anything, it's all about androgens and DHT right? Well under the mainstream hypothesis minoxidil doesn't work, a lot of the write ups I read on it actually completely disregard minoxidil simply for the sake of the theory. Typically you hear "no one knows by which mechanism minoxidil works, it's a mystery to science."

It's easy to assume that minoxidil being a vasodilator, grows hair by increasing bloodflow to the follicles consistently over long periods of application. I've heard some hypothesize min actually has an effect on PGD2 and PGE2 but I believe the primary mechanism is as simple as bloodflow. After you break your arm and finally take the cast off you will notice the hair is longer and thicker there, this is from increased blood and nutrient supply to the area from the healing process. The same way in which microneedling regrows hair. So anything that increases bloodflow to the follicle should theoretically have a positive impact on hair growth.

Scalp massages work by two mechanisms:
Increases bloodflow to the scalp and follicles (this is a temporary boost to the follicles and it's unlikely to have much of a long term benefit)
Breaking up the fibrosis / relieving scalp tension (this is much more likely the mechanism in which scalp massages grow hair as it puts the scalp into a better condition where blood flow is more consistent and the balding process lessened.)

When you consider how long you actually have to have minoxidil on your head, almost 24/7 it becomes hard to imagine something that would increase blood flow to the follicles over that period of time. Unless you are consistently massaging your head which is unrealistic it's unlikely you'd have much regrowth at all. You need a way to provide consistent blood flow to the actual follicle and not just the scalp. The fibrosis in the scalp is the main cause of inhibiting bloodflow killing off the follicles. They are chronically deprived and a short little boost of blood supply is unlikely to do much.

Fibrosis is found in the scalps of building men, under the hypothesis I believe DHT causes the fibrosis as an inflammatory response in relation to chronic scalp tension. There is a good little test that you can do to prove the validity of this, if you pinch the scalp in the areas which are bald you will notice the skin is both thicker and less pliable than areas of hair growth, this is due to fibrosis.

Minoxidil is actually rather ineffective alone and the fibrosis explains it, derma rolling dramatically improves the results of minoxidil and it's not because it increases absorption. You actually want quite the opposite since it can have some serious health effects if absorbed into the bloodstream. Aside from supplying the follicles with a consistent blood supply from the healing process derma rolling also likely partially breaks up and reverses the fibrosis present in the scalp allowing minoxidil to do its job to a better degree.

I've heard from a few people before getting a hair transplant the scalp is often derma rolled and massaged so it is in a suitable state to sustain the transplanted hair. The most recent of which is this guy who got a professional opinion on the options. I was surprised to find that his views on current treatments perfectly reflected my own based on my personal research.

My anecdotal experiences (Regrowth thread here)
So far I've had good results from scalp massages, folliculitis, scalp itch, excessive greasiness and shiny scalp qualities are no longer present and overall hair quality has seemed to improved, it seems to have more life, it's stronger, springy and can support its own weight as opposed to just flopping down. Also while massaging in the shower I've had a few healthy hairs accidentally rip from my scalp, what I found is that they were incredibly thick and about 3-4cm in length. I'm just going to call them super hairs and make a post about them in the future.

When I stopped massaging
Around the very start of August I was growing rather happy with my regrowth and I thus became more lazy. Hairloss was consuming too much of my life and I managed to get a lot of study for my future in and I slowly did less and less scalp massages. It went from a few minutes a day, to a couple to just 30 seconds and then I stopped completely. Everyone was rather dismissive my regrowth was actually a result of scalp massages and attributed it to nizoral and derma rolling. During this period I continued those and stopped fish oil, scalp massages and exercises as I was losing faith with everyone's dismissal, my sleep pattern went downhill severely and there was 2 days which I skipped showers. What I noticed was that my scalp itch was coming back and so was some of my dermatitis, this sort of sent me into an alert state as typically the itching is accompanied by shedding in my experienced so I doubled down on Nizoral and my dermatitis and itch continued. I tried to get back to doing scalp massages but every time I'd start my hair would start shedding quite a lot so I was too scared to lose my gains but the itch and dermatitis was slowly getting worse.

Eventually I decided to stop Nizoral application and just use scalp massages. Interestingly my scalp itch and dermatitis disappeared although on the day of the massage I shed a couple of hundred hairs just in the shower alone. My hairline and the top front middle of my head took a hit, my vertex was as thick as ever though. Interestingly I never massaged or micro needled my vertex often as it's difficult getting back there which could also mean the regrowth experienced there wasn't as reliant on massages/wounding. Currently my hairline is back to regrowing, a few days ago it looked like I had tons of blackheads with all the hairs sprouting back out. During this whole period vellus hair seemed to be unaffected and was as healthy and as long as ever. I also reintroduced Nizoral which led to a minor shed which was interesting. As of now I'm no longer shedding hairs again and I typically only lose 5-10 per massage in the shower.

The regrowth isn't likely sustainable
Despite growing any hair you're not actually stopping the balding process so finasteride would likely still need to be used anyways, I've tried looking into natural alternatives and there simply isn't anything quite like finasteride in terms of effectiveness. I've heard positive things about topical finasteride which gets around the potential sides. Currently I'm not using finasteride but I'm considering finasteride for the future if I lose any ground. If your balding slowly it's possible the regrowth could outpace the balding.

I've heard some positive things about essential oils such as castor oil, peppermint oil and rosemary oil. Out of those castor oil has no scientific backing but peppermint and rosemary do, most notably rosemary oil also being a vasodilator was found to be equivalent to minoxidil 2% in hair regrowth. That's not too bad for a natural alternative although there simply isn't enough information on those oils for me to commit spending money on them. I struggle to find much about how often to apply and if it needs to be left in, I don't really want to spend money on an inferior minoxidil if I have to leave it on my head for 8 hours. Additionally the limited information means that any potential side effects aren't known.

Studies:
The main study around scalp massages (detumescence) which found that 20x minute massages daily resulted in 90% regrowth isn't credible and most likely untrue as it's published in a predatory open access journal by a publisher (OMICS) known for accepting fraudulent papers.

Luckily however there is one legitimate study that has been done, it found that 4x minute scalp massages daily increased follicle width although density was unchanged. Gene expression was also changed via the massages. Now if we think about the actual balding process the hairs don't completely die out initially, they get weaker and weaker, eventually turn to vellus hairs and slowly fade away into almost nothing. Boosting the strength of an individual follicle would increase its overall health and lifespan and could possibly bring back some of the healthier vellus hairs to a terminal state.

The main hypothesis I believe, it's worth noting that literally every theory in the hairloss world is a hypothesis as male pattern baldness isn't something that has been solved yet.

There is a link between the balding pattern and chronic tension on the scalp. This most likely plays a part with androgens and DHT in the actual balding process. Under the hypothesis I believe DHT is used as an inflammatory response to chronic scalp tension in people that have the necessary genes. this leads to fibrosis in the scalp which inhibits blood and nutrient supply to the follicle.

I could only find a single study which only used microneedling as a control group, it was found to be more effective than minoxidil alone in terms of regrowth. This is quite promising for mechanical stimulation as a means to regrow hair.
Regrowth 24weeks:
Minoxidil only 18.8/cm2
Microneedling 23.4/cm2
Microneedling + Min 38.3/cm2

I know this is a mouse study but I actually only just found this study when looking for why moles grow darker and thicker hairs Blood Vessels Hold Key To Thicker Hair Growth, the interesting part is that it states "The discovery that increasing blood flow to the scalp helps stave off baldness may be old news to many barbers. For years, they have been advising clients to massage their scalps as way of stimulating circulation and hair growth." I actually had no idea this information had been around for so long, it's not entirely relevant but it definitely points at the fact of blood flow equates to hair growth.

How to do the massages -
This video more or less describes it well enough.

The technique isn't entirely important as long as you are breaking up the fibrosis and promoting blood flow to the follicles. To do this you need to go quite deep and forceful into the scalp. If you are doing the massage correctly after some time you will hear an odd crunching sound. I made a thread about this awhile ago. I can only assume this is the fibrotic tissue in the scalp being broken up, the more you massage the less and less of this crunch you will hear although it slowly comes back if you stop doing them. This is the best way to gauge how much you need to massage as opposed to massage x minutes daily. Typically I massage around 5 minutes a day, in the early days you should massage a bit more. Perhaps 15-20, just however long it takes to break the fibrosis up, after it's mostly broken up it's primarily maintenance from there so you can reduce the massage time and just not let it get back to that state again.

Conclusion
I can't say definitely that scalp massages will regrow hair but based on my research I see zero reason why they wouldn't have some benefit. A lot of the science behind it makes a lot of sense and it connects well into the mainstream hypothesis along with chronic scalp tension and androgens etc. I honestly can't find a single reason why scalp massages wouldn't have some beneficial effect on hair growth. Regardless of hair growth it definitely had a positive effect on my overall scalp health and condition which is a good enough reason to trial it out for yourself.

edit. I reached out about the scalp massages to someone who is much more educated than I, it was the creator of this hypothesis. They don't have a definite answer to the crunches but here was their take.
"Thanks for reaching out. It’s a great question, and one that’s not always the easiest to answer. I think the evidence tends to suggest that the crunches we sometimes hear from massaging are more likely edema (swelling), and less likely the breaking up of fibrotic tissue. This is mainly because morphologically, fibrotic tissue doesn’t typically detach from healthy tissues and produce noise when manipulated. Rather, it’s the acute inflammation from the massages that promotes anagen-associated growth factors which then help attenuate / metabolize part of that fibrotic tissue as the skin remodels."

When you do a pretty vigorous rub do you shed a lot after that?

 

[pizzadriver1933]

.

Hey there, i just saw your pic of you pinching your skin, quite impressive. But wouldn't you run into issues with skin that elastic of hanging down when getting older? This might read just as a very uneducated, naive thought, but i don't know lol, hanging skin is an issue on the body at least.

The first time i've read about skin fibrosis i started to massage the area around my vertex as well. The skin being too tight and thick and started digging in my fingernails to get a good tight pinch and the skin was very nicely flushed up with blood (can you say it like that?).

But i got a bit lazy with it, as always with stuff i'm trying and not seeing any change in apprx. 2 months... but after reading this thread i'm going after it again.

The only thing else i'm doing right now is applying some oil mixture. I feel like since starting all this, apprx 2-3months ago...the center of my vertex MAYBE got a bit more denser in appearance, but my hairline around the temples seems to keep on receiding slowly :/

I'm too afraid of dermarolling for some reason lol, but i'm reading lots of good stuff... will see..

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

Hey there, i just saw your pic of you pinching your skin, quite impressive. But wouldn't you run into issues with skin that elastic of hanging down when getting older? This might read just as a very uneducated, naive thought, but i don't know lol, hanging skin is an issue on the body at least.

The first time i've read about skin fibrosis i started to massage the area around my vertex as well. The skin being too tight and thick and started digging in my fingernails to get a good tight pinch and the skin was very nicely flushed up with blood (can you say it like that?).

But i got a bit lazy with it, as always with stuff i'm trying and not seeing any change in apprx. 2 months... but after reading this thread i'm going after it again.

The only thing else i'm doing right now is applying some oil mixture. I feel like since starting all this, apprx 2-3months ago...the center of my vertex MAYBE got a bit more denser in appearance, but my hairline around the temples seems to keep on receiding slowly :/

I'm too afraid of dermarolling for some reason lol, but i'm reading lots of good stuff... will see..

Actually it's a possibility and it's a thought that's crossed my mind. I've read in the past that smile lines and nabosial folds are caused be stretching of the skin but I'd need to look into it again for its validity. If it ever does reach that point I imagine you can just take care your skin and help promote collagen and elastin. I'm only 20 myself so that's not really an issue for me.

I also imagine you followed the original DT method of massaging 20 minutes, possibly twice daily? That's definitely a big time commitment and I don't have the motivation and effort to do that every single day over the next couple of years. Once you loosen your scalp up you should be able to get away with around 5 minutes a day.

If you want the best results I'd definitely consider derma rolling/microneedling, if you're scared of the needle perhaps you could try a 0,5mm, it's not really deep enough to make you bleed and it doesn't hurt at all really, ideally you want to be using a 1.5mm roller though.

 

[pizzadriver1933]

I'm not afraid of pain or anything, more like being afraid of handling it wrong, not sterilizing it right or dirt gets into the wounds and i'm getting an infection or something like that. That might be because i didn't really research the right application for this thing, yet.

You're 20 now, yeah but that'll change obviously. I'm 34 now, and i can just tell you; skin's not AS TIGHT as it used to be It's not bad, but it's not going better either i assume. Just wondering what would be if i started with heavy elastic massage 14 years ago. But i think it's also a matter of not completely overdoing it.

I don't even know what the original DT Method is. I just read somewhere about skin fibrosis and blood flow in that area and tried a regular massage technique one would do...to no effect because skin was too tight and thick. So i thought it would be the best to pinch it with the help of my fingernails to get a good grip, and the hole area was pretty red for minutes, which is what i wanted to achieve. But not 20 minutes, i don't have the patience for that, after max of 5 minutes my skin had enough anyway.

 

[neddy2016]

Apparently there is a risk for some people that massaging the scalp could actually help DHT attack the scalp rather then stop it?

whilst they can temporarily increase blood flow to the scalp, in the majority of cases can only help to improve the condition of the hair but cannot treat a hair loss condition. In fact, in the case of genetic hair loss – Male Pattern Baldness or Female Pattern Hair Loss – it may actually make the shedding worse by assisting the DHT which causes pattern hair loss to circulate.

https://www.beIgraviacentre.com/blog/what-is-the-pinch-technique-for-hair-growth/