What do you think of low-dose finasteride?

[infamousrodi]

I would do the same if I were in your shoes.

Yeah I’ll do it if my hair worsens. I’m not sure if it is right now. Hopefully it stays the same for another ten years lol. If you were me would you hop on finasteride at .5mg yet?

 

[jamesbooker1975]

Obviously there has been a lot of discussion regarding SERUM DHT and using lower dosages. What about SCALP DHT? Check out Kevin's video. I didn't even know such a study existed. Problem is that it is obviously one study. Could doses of 0.05-0.25mg potentially be nearly as potent for reducing DHT in the scalp?

@DoctorHouse
@Experimentality

Use it topically at low dose . 0.025 % .

 

[20YearsOnFin]

I was hoping we could get into some theorizing regarding what would be the optimal lower dosage.

I don't think you will find a one size fits all optimal lower dosage, like most people seam to report its just a case of trial and error to see what's the lowest dose that personally works for yourself, those two Aussie Doctor's on youtube are adamant 1mg 3 times a week is a good place to start, where as there's other people who say they need to take half a 5mg tablet every 2 days or get best results taking a whole 5mg tablet every 3 days etc. even though there is no evidence to back up the need for an increased dose, the important factor just seam's to be keeping it as stable and regular as possible to avoid inducing a shed.

 

[debyne]

There's a lack of outcome evidence to suggest anything below 0.2mg of finasteride will work for the maintenance of hair.

Something to make note of is that it takes time for the 5AR enzyme to regenerate. There's evidence to suggest that taking the medication on alternate days could provide the same benefit as taking it daily as a result.

For those curious, there was a study conducted by Vermeulen et al. that details this https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1722168/.

The relevant figure:

If you use the 0.5mg and 5mg dose as a proxy for 1mg, it would appear that serum DHT levels, and by extension tissue levels, only begin to significantly rise three days after the dose.

The question is, what dose do you take on alternate days? There are various hair transplant specialists that anecdotally claim that taking 1mg on alternate days produces favorable outcomes, and that most people respond to this. This is the dose that I personally take and it seems to be doing its job.

Anecdotally, I've heard of people having success with 0.5mg on alternate days, but I would wager that these are likely incidents of non-aggressive hair loss.

There's a lack of outcome evidence to suggest anything below 0.2mg of finasteride will work for the maintenance of hair.

Something to make note of is that it takes time for the 5AR enzyme to regenerate. There's evidence to suggest that taking the medication on alternate days could provide the same benefit as taking it daily as a result.

For those curious, there was a study conducted by Vermeulen et al. that details this https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1722168/.

The relevant figure:

View attachment 172503

If you use the 0.5mg and 5mg dose as a proxy for 1mg, it would appear that serum DHT levels, and by extension tissue levels, only begin to significantly rise three days after the dose.

The question is, what dose do you take on alternate days? There are various hair transplant specialists that anecdotally claim that taking 1mg on alternate days produces favorable outcomes, and that most people respond to this. This is the dose that I personally take and it seems to be doing its job.

Anecdotally, I've heard of people having success with 0.5mg on alternate days, but I would wager that these are likely incidents of non-aggressive hair loss.

I've been thinking a lot about this graph and my experience with 1mg ED vs 0.5 ED vs 1mg EOD. It's clear from this graph that 0.5 ED and 1mg EOD should not have the same efficacy. It's a bummer they don't have 1mg as an option above...why they picked 1.5mg is beyond me, but I graphed out what it might look like if I split the difference between 1.5mg and 0.5mg on the chart--see below

This means that you could likely get away with 1mg every 3 days and it would still be more effective than 0.5mg ED, correct?

 

[Norwoody]

I've been thinking a lot about this graph and my experience with 1mg ED vs 0.5 ED vs 1mg EOD. It's clear from this graph that 0.5 ED and 1mg EOD should not have the same efficacy. It's a bummer they don't have 1mg as an option above...why they picked 1.5mg is beyond me, but I graphed out what it might look like if I split the difference between 1.5mg and 0.5mg on the chart--see below

This means that you could likely get away with 1mg every 3 days and it would still be more effective than 0.5mg ED, correct?

It’s possible. One decent size dose will block most of the enzymatic activity for a couple days, so serum values don’t mean much. We need more studies on this drug, specifically a long term scalp DHT and hair count study with various dosages.

 

[user394587]

I've been thinking a lot about this graph and my experience with 1mg ED vs 0.5 ED vs 1mg EOD. It's clear from this graph that 0.5 ED and 1mg EOD should not have the same efficacy. It's a bummer they don't have 1mg as an option above...why they picked 1.5mg is beyond me, but I graphed out what it might look like if I split the difference between 1.5mg and 0.5mg on the chart--see below

This means that you could likely get away with 1mg every 3 days and it would still be more effective than 0.5mg ED, correct?

DHT is a paracrine hormone, meaning it is primarily produced in the tissues where it exerts its effects. Serum DHT only accounts for a small amount of DHT in the body, and it is mostly what travels from the tissues into the bloodstream. If you start to see serum levels rising, that could potentially mean that the levels in the tissues are a bit higher. This is speculation on my end, but that's the reason why I'm taking it every other day as opposed to having longer times inbetween dosages.

 

[Jeju]

For all the anti finasteride people, it will be interesting to see what they will do if they get diagnosed with an enlarged prostate later in life.

I’d rather get diagnosed with prostate cancer at 60 than spend the next 25 years with weak boners and some desire to bang my girl.
You say that as though anyone not on finasteride will get prostate cancer and finasteride users will be healthy and saved haha

 

[20YearsOnFin]

Anyway, don't want to derail this thread anymore.

Bit late to say that now.

 

[20YearsOnFin]

but there are many more red flags.

There is a 45 year old guy a few post's up whose been on finasteride for 13 years, i think he has earnt the right at his point in life to make his own decisions without being babysat and having people point out 'red flags' over his choices, there are currenty 2 threads open to tell us that our dicks are about to fall off at any moment, is it too much to ask to have one thread where long term finasteride users can discuss doses?

 

[20YearsOnFin]

Lol why are you so butthurt 24/7? I already said I wouldn't post any more studies since it's clear how much they trigger your fragile ego. Continue discussing your hormone treatments. But I'm sure you're eager to respond with more derailing bs since you always want the last word.

Have ever thought of replying to people without copy and pasting all your usual dum phrase's like 'butthurt' 'triggerd' fragile etc its fairly tedious reading your simpleton replies. And by the way you are still derailing this thread so why don't you take your zix and all your hair system brochures to a different thread.

 

[20YearsOnFin]

Hahaha, like fcking clockwork, so pathetic always wanting the last word. When are you going to act your age old man?

But fine, keep derailing the thread with your butthurt responses, I don't care.

So Im "mr always want the last word" but you are still here and can't stop repling how does that make even make sense?

 

[BurningCoals]

Can we not turn this into the pro-anti finasteride debate? There is already a thread for that. I was hoping we could get into some theorizing regarding what would be the optimal lower dosage.

This lasted long lol

 

[corkmeister]

I'm no fan of finasteride but it's kind of tiresome to see the same people derailing threads about finasteride, only to then accuse others of derailing the thread.

 

[20YearsOnFin]

I've been thinking a lot about this graph and my experience with 1mg ED vs 0.5 ED vs 1mg EOD. It's clear from this graph that 0.5 ED and 1mg EOD should not have the same efficacy. It's a bummer they don't have 1mg as an option above...why they picked 1.5mg is beyond me, but I graphed out what it might look like if I split the difference between 1.5mg and 0.5mg on the chart--see below

This means that you could likely get away with 1mg every 3 days and it would still be more effective than 0.5mg ED, correct?

Although the younger of these guy's often gets picked apart because he apparently falsified some qualifications.

I still find some of the info in this video interesting.

they claim the half life of finasteride in the hair follicle is 30 days

knudsen claim's he has always prescribed a less frequent dose, even going back to when finasteride was first released which I think is rare.

He mostly recommends a less frequent dose ( bench mark of 1mg 3 times a week) rather than a reduce dosage of 0.5mg etc (unless the dosage needs to be reduced for side effect toleration?

Overall Knudsen seams to be a knowledgeable and respected guy in his field regardless of the other guys history.

 

[debyne]

I saw those videos. Good content and they have a lot of real life examples given they treat patients with hairloss for a living.

 

[20YearsOnFin]

I saw those videos. Good content and they have a lot of real life examples given they treat patients with hairloss for a living.

I would imagine he has access to some really useful documented data collected over the last 25 years, dose's, long term efficacy, side effect profile etc, all while prescribing the drug at under half the recommended dose, its a shame he doesn't collate it all and publish his findings as the documented results over 25years would make a interesting read.

 

[Mustang]

Many clinics recommend 1mg per week and 2mg per week

0.25MG EOD or 0.5mg EOD.

 

[debyne]

After I try 1mg EOD, if I have great efficacy, I may explore going 1mg every 3 days as an experiment just to see how long I can stretch it out.

 

[debyne]

Anything under 0.5 mg per day is not worth the effort.

Maybe for you, but there are people who maintain their hair on less. If there's one thing I've learned all these years on finasteride is that there's no one-size-fits-all to it.

 

[kidcurry96]

The substantial difference is that Saw Palmetto is a much weaker 5ar-inhibitor with very weak evidence for significantly stopping hair loss, both in studies and anecdotally. Can you show me the studies that show that 320mg of Saw Palmetto has similar results to taking 1mg of finasteride? I'm not well versed enough in the science surrounding Saw Palmetto to say you're wrong without a doubt but this seems very unlikely to me, although I'd be curious to read the studies.

I don't understand the leap of logic you're making here to be honest. You conclude that lower dosages of finasteride can't work, because otherwise Saw Palmetto would work and we would have heard about it by now, but at the same time you also believe that using Saw Palmetto is comparable to taking 1mg of finasteride? Of which the latter has been proven to be highly effective at stopping hair loss?

The majority of users found low dose finasteride to be ineffective? What are you basing this on? The studies show that lower doses (let's say 0.2mg) reduce a comparable level of scalp dht, and improve hair count. Not as well as 1mg daily, but somewhat comparable. And I also know that at least in Japan 0.2mg tablets are available. It may not be effective for everyone but based on the data I see no real basis to conclude that these doses are necessarily ineffective.

And how is the study I cited a 'pro-finasteride' study? You think they forged the results to show that lower doses of finasteride can also be effective? What agenda would that serve? To get people to buy less finasteride? And the findings are questionable because you've personally observed that the 'majority of users' found low doses to be ineffective? I really don't understand how you're arriving at these conclusions.

"only 38% ofpatients treated with Serenoa repens had an increase in hair growth, while 68% of those treated with finasteride noted an improvement. Moreover finasteride was more effective for more than half of the patients (33 of 50, i.e, 66%), with level II and III alopecia"

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Not as effective for sure. IDK if there are other studies.