Why do scientists have such a difficult time finding a cure?

[Obsidian]

Number of reasons. Funding is one, not really many angel investors when it comes to this compared to other businesses and Government funding is hard to do. I mean a lot of you keep saying it's disease but in the large run, compared to HIV and Cancer, which is going to get more funding? Another like mentioned before is priority, hair loss ranks low on the totem pole in diseases to solve. Three, just so many factors in hair loss and not just genetics. We have only mapped so far of the human genome and body. Don't let those movies fool you that we are 50 years ahead.

Be glad we have come this far. I would have hated to be born in the 50's and start losing my hair in the late 60's/ early 70's, the worst decade to lose hair imo because everyone had it long, even extremely consverative people.

Do I wish for more new treatments? Yes, but I hardly see some global conspiracy to keep hair loss-sufferers down. If there was, we would see more of it instead of crackpot theories.

Besides look at the sales for Propecia, it's probably one of Merck's least big money-makers.

For most of you guys taking your treatments, having success, but whining about it, stop taking meds and see what really happens.

 

[anxious1]

This is not true, male pattern baldness IS a disease since it is a pathological process occurring at the level of the hair follicle. It is NOT natural.

That is as ridiculous as saying that the common cold is not an illness just because it has no serious health consequences.

Furthermore, male pattern baldness is associated with increased risk of other diseases such as cardiovascular disease.

i still disagree!

i maintain it is a natural process, but granted humans may accelerate it with lifestyle choices. I feel a genetic trait is the best description. Afterall its called androgenetic alopecia, short for androgen - genetic hairloss.

and the common cold is caused by a virus. It is an infection. and it can have serious health consequences.

I dont see how people can conclude male pattern baldness is linked to cardiovascular disease, when over 50% of males eventually exhibit signs of male pattern baldness. Is it only these 50% that suffer cardiovascular disease?, i doubt it.

I do however believe certain people that have accelerated male pattern baldness with alcohol and smoking, and diet, suffer more from cardiovascular disease, however thats linked to their lifestyle not to the male pattern baldness.

In any case calling or not calling it a disease has no bearing on the lack of a cure. Until we can alter our expression of genes, there will be no cure, only treatments.

 

[Nashville Hairline]

I dont like the 'disease' word either, it implies there is an unwanted organism in us causing our hair to fall out..whereas the truth is DHT and 5-ar are both extremely important constituents for our proper functioning.

 

[keepinthehair]

Going bald is no more a disease than getting wrikles, fading eyesight/hearing, growing hair in the ears, having saggy skin etc. It is a natural process, unfortunately the media sends the message to society that youth/beauty sells products and makes money.

I wonder how many people in third world countries really give a crap about losing hair when they have an empty belly and no money in their pocket. I have it great, I dwell on my hair loss disease.

 

[freakout]

male pattern baldness is NOT is disease. It's NOT a normal process.
It's a symptom because it associates with many diseases.
You cannot 'cure' a symptom.

It's actually tragic when it is the third world countries who seem to keep more hair.
It's like diabetis and obesity which pervades first world countries.

 

[anxious1]

the Thread can't be ended yet. It wasnt even about calling it a disease it was about scientists finding a cure.


i said:

i have a family member with a limb amputated, and others with cancer.

to them, me complaining about hairloss is just pathetic.

scientists can't find a cure, because male pattern baldness is not a disease. Its a perfectly natural situation.

And yes certain types of hairloss are related to health but not male pattern baldness. At best its accelerated by lifestyle, but not caused by it.

furthermore, theres a pill to stop it progressing, granted its not ideal cos of side effects but still, its something, and they can also transplant hairs almost perfectly undetectible.

i hope for something better too, but u have to face facts, this might be it for a while.

Global said:

This is not true, male pattern baldness IS a disease since it is a pathological process occurring at the level of the hair follicle. It is NOT natural.

That is as ridiculous as saying that the common cold is not an illness just because it has no serious health consequences.

Furthermore, male pattern baldness is associated with increased risk of other diseases such as cardiovascular disease.

Then i said:

i still disagree!

i maintain it is a natural process, but granted humans may accelerate it with lifestyle choices. I feel a genetic trait is the best description. Afterall its called androgenetic alopecia, short for androgen - genetic hairloss.

and the common cold is caused by a virus. It is an infection. and it can have serious health consequences.

I dont see how people can conclude male pattern baldness is linked to cardiovascular disease, when over 50% of males eventually exhibit signs of male pattern baldness. Is it only these 50% that suffer cardiovascular disease?, i doubt it.

I do however believe certain people that have accelerated male pattern baldness with alcohol and smoking, and diet, suffer more from cardiovascular disease, however thats linked to their lifestyle not to the male pattern baldness.

In any case calling or not calling it a disease has no bearing on the lack of a cure. Until we can alter our expression of genes, there will be no cure, only treatments.

 

[DTW]

Reading through posts on this board, there are some very bright individuals here (yourself included), who I was hoping could provide some intelligent theories on why this is a difficult disease/condition, whatever, to treat?

Well man, I'm sorry if I offended you, I was a little harsh on you, but I just thought that it was in bad taste to compare the treatment of Androgenetic Alopecia with the treatment of life threatening illnesses, some people's lives actually depend on a cure, it's not the same with male pattern baldness...

The truth of the matter is that research scientists, will have to conduct years of intricate research to determine an effective way of reversing the problem, this will take a lot of dedicated research scientists, Adequate funding, years of research, and a bit of luck; and frankly there's no telling when this will happen.

A lot of very promising new discoveries have been made recently, and the emerging research in stem cells may lead to a cure. Afterall, scientists have recently invented a new device that adminasters stem cells to burn damaged tissue, it has been shown to completely reverse third degree burns in as little as three days, with no scar tissue, this is just one example of the regenerative properties of stem cells, it may be possible, to one day do something similar with hair follicles....

This is interesting. But discouraging at the same time...I mean the possibilty of any cure of treatment being light years away.

What are your thoughts on what triggers onset of hair loss? For example, i've never had any issue with my hair, no change in diet and or lifestyle, yet my hair has been rapidly deteriorating since after this past summer. So I'm new to all of this alopecia stuff and available treatments. I'm 29 years old, by the way

 

[freakout]

Why do scientists have such a difficult time finding a cure?

Are you asking if they can't fintd a way to make hair grow? Or are you asking if they can't find what's causing it?

Well I know there are some average ways to grow hair with average results...But I suppose a bit of both

One of the effects of diabetes is 'foot loss'. You can 'treat' the wounds in the foot but you cannot 'cure' 'foot loss' because the wounds will just coming until you lose the foot OR prevent diabetes. Diabetes is a lifestyle disease once thought to be 'genetic'.

In the same way, you can treat hair loss but you cannot 'cure' hair loss because it is the effect and it will keep just coming until you prevent the cause.

Don't believe the faceless 'experts' here saying it 'basically' 'nothing but' genetics. How genetics plays a role in male pattern baldness is not very well understood while studies are still ongoing on what's really causing it albeit with a small budget.

Genetics science is still in its embryonic stage. We don't know how genetics works.

There are studies which show that coffee drinkers are less likely to develop male pattern baldness. The positive effect is not big - probably about 15% more or less will benefit BUT it's a sign that genetics is NOT all there is in male pattern baldness.

 

[anxious1]

Diabetes is a lifestyle disease once thought to be 'genetic'.

Incorrect - people can be born with type 1 diabetes.

Genetics science is still in its embryonic stage. We don't know how genetics works.

um - excuse me i have just completed about 4 university units in genetics, and we do know alot about how it works. The entire human genome has been mapped.

granted there is alot of the genes that we havent found its purpose yet, but on how it all works, we are pretty informed.

 

[freakout]

Diabetes is a lifestyle disease once thought to be 'genetic'.

Incorrect - people can be born with type 1 diabetes.
[quote:2jqsj9ke]Genetics science is still in its embryonic stage. We don't know how genetics works.

um - excuse me i have just completed about 4 university units in genetics, and we do know alot about how it works. The entire human genome has been mapped.
granted there is alot of the genes that we havent found its purpose yet, but on how it all works, we are pretty informed.[/quote:2jqsj9ke]
Whether Diabetes Type 1 is 'genetic' is a theory. It's also rare.

Whether Diabetes type 2 is a 'lifestyle' condition is a fact. It is also about as common as male baldness.

The epidemic nature of male baldness and its association with several diseases implies that it is also a lifestyle condition.
-------------------------------------
I hope to God you did not major in genetics because there is no way conventional beliefs in genetics can acount for more than 100,000 proteins and cell differentiation - just to name a few - with only 23,000 genes.

Emerging sciences like genomics and epigenetics is capable of answering all that including male baldness. When these two sciences combine, it will be the ultimate for me.

Genes are nothing much but numbers like the bytes in your computer HDD. Personally, I'd say goodbye to associating genes with traits.
------------------------------------
I already secretly tested finfighters IQ when I debated with him. I fed him his own foot several times. You can tell by how he responds, right? You think he needs to go back to school?

 

[anxious1]

Congats! on your studies! Outside of this discussion (I mean in general) what did you learn about gene expression? In short, what did you learn about epigenetics. Just in a nutshell! No great detail needed (unless you want to)!

i'm no expert, im doing a medical science degree, but it has some units on genetics, and cell biology. but i tend to forget stuff each semester when i move on to new units.

In a nutshell gene expression is genetic material turning into products. The base pairs ATGC transcribe into single stranded RNA which then becomes a template that moves through ribosomes that identifies sets of 3 base pairs called codons that each translate into a amino acid, then the ribosomes make the amino acid and discard the template, and combinations of amino acids make proteins, which contort into secondary, tertiary and quarternary shapes by bending and amino acids bonding with other amino acids further round the bends. Transcription factors and other proteins dictate what sections of DNA will be copied into a RNA template. So the same set of genetic material in each cell, can be expressed in millions of ways.

thats my quick explanation u can find better in depth explanations on the net.

Whether Diabetes Type 1 is 'genetic' is a theory. It's also rare.

Whether Diabetes type 2 is a 'lifestyle' condition is a fact. It is also about as common as male baldness.

i would say the other way round. I would much sooner call it factual that Type 1 is genetic sooner than i would say type 2 is caused by lifestyle. I know it can be caused or accelerated by lifestyle, but i thought u still have to have a genetic disposition to it.

I hope to God you did not major in genetics because there is no way conventional beliefs in genetics can acount for more than 100,000 proteins and cell differentiation - just to name a few - with only 23,000 genes.

i didn't major in genetics or anything. Its a general medical science degree, but i dont see how that relates to ur statement.

why can't 100 000 proteins and cell differentiation be explained by genetics?
u dont need a whole gene to encode one protein. theres 3 billion base pairs in the human genome, and u only need 3 to encode one amino acid. And all proteins are made with combinations and configerations of the same 20 amino acids

Genes are nothing much but numbers like the bytes in your computer HDD. Personally, I'd say goodbye to associating genes with traits.

well those bytes on the computer harddrive control the entire computer and everything it does. all with 1's and 0's.

 

[freakout]

Yeap, that's just it. When you consider several genes and consider the entire 3 billion base pairs, we are traversing to another discipline - genomics.

Certainly every condition, every disease, trait involves genes. But, for example, how do we explain a gene that's associated with both the operation of the heart and male baldness??

Associating certain genes with certain traits or diseases is increasingly being met with opposition and paradoxes that cannot be resolved without considering epigenetics and genomics.

well those bytes on the computer harddrive control the entire computer and everything it does. all with 1's and 0's.

No actually. They determine the software. Once they load the software into memory and CPU, the software is in controll of the HDD. The software can even erase the the entire HDD.

Yeap, just like life is in control of the genome. A bacteria can survive for months with its nuclei (genome) removed.

 

[anxious1]

but genomics is the study of entire genomes and is within the heading of genetics, so when u say something can't be explained by genetics u r saying it can't be explained by genomics either.

the production of 100 000+ different proteins can be explained by genetics. A genome is just the total amount of genetic material in a cell.

 

[freakout]

Hmm...

Genetics assigns a trait to a particular gene or set of genes. A gene a unit that comprises the genome.

In genomics, the genome is THE unit that's comprised of genes.

If you don't see the critical difference between the two, we should end this.

If you don't believe diabetes type 2 is a lifestyle disease, just read up. There are plenty of articles about it.

 

[freakout]

Until you can implement 'gene therapy', don't you think it's rather useless to even talk about sometihng that you can do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about?

Read up on epigenetics so you might be able to do something about your 'genetic makeup' and your brain.

 

[freakout]

I'm working on it. It's sad since you won't find out about it.

 

[UunoTurhapuro]

I'm working on it. It's sad since you won't find out about it.

How can you comment on something that you're working on and haven't seen any results? Your last sentence is quite common amongst sellers/marketing reps.

 

[freakout]

actually no. In fact, I am refraining from even saying anything about it because I will sound like I am promotting a product.

 

[freakout]

Say all you want. You're the one who's been promoting NONE-FDA approved drugs. You're not even a quack doctor.

 

[freakout]

I'm a king. But for the first time, I heard you say conditons are triggered by lifestyle. Very much inline with epigenetic principles. THANIK YOU.