2 days ago
The preemptive hair-loss treatment for men with a full head of hair
'It's a chronic condition,' says Dr Marco Nicoloso, 'like having diabetes, where you need to take insulin for the rest of your life.' Nicoloso is describing androgenetic alopecia — that is, male pattern baldness. 'As with diabetes, where you cannot just have one procedure and then it is treated for ever, it's the same with hair loss. The progression is gradual, progressive and chronic.'
Nicoloso and his equally telegenic colleague Dr Thivos Sokratous are the lead medical practitioners at Ouronyx, 'the home of mindful aesthetics'. The discretely luxurious clinic in a converted bank vault is located in the heart of St James's, opposite Hancocks the jewellers and the venerable fine wine merchants Justerini & Brooks.
Here, from their spotless, space-age consultation rooms, the doctors are fighting a war against hair loss. Ouronyx offers a range of techniques, chief among them a pioneering treatment called AMT — short for autologous micrografting treatment — but popularly known as micrografting. The procedure has also been termed the 'lunch hour hair transplant', and it has swiftly become popular due to before/after images of men whose hair coverage has been transformed from wispy to generous. The photos don't promise the Lego-like density and suspiciously straight hairline of a trip to Turkey, but rather a natural head of hair that looks genuinely healthier-looking. Hair that seems thicker, more lustrous — like it's actually growing back.
What's more, unlike full-blown hair transplants, which generally utilise the time-consuming technique of FUE (follicular unit extraction), requiring one's head to be fully shaved and a lengthy process of removing and then reimplanting healthy follicles, followed by months of regrowth — filming a video diary on social media documenting the process is, believe it or not, optional — micrografting sells itself on being quick, scar-free and swiftly effective, with no shaving required.
I have come to Ouronyx simply to interview Nicoloso and Sokratous about the process — at least that was the initial plan.
'You know, we could run some tests to see if you'd be a suitable candidate,' Sokratous says. 'If … you're interested?' I have — secretly — been interested in pre-emptive measures against hair loss for the entirety of my adult life.
At some point in my late teens I perceived what I deemed to be signs of my hairline creeping back. Thus, I arrived at university gripped with the paranoid fear that I would be entirely bald by my third year. I therefore spent 90 per cent of my time wearing a beloved yet ill-advised H&M train driver's hat, which, for reasons unknown, I paired with an oversized sheepskin jacket (making the fact that I was able to attract a girlfriend a scientific mystery beyond the comprehension even of doctors like Nicoloso and Sokratous). I didn't go bald. In fact, I'm truly not certain whether my hairline has shifted in the slightest since then. But, ever since that first moment — standing in a bathroom in my home town of Portsmouth, pulling back my adolescent ringlets — that quiet insecurity that it's all on the verge of falling out has never left me.
Hair loss is a growth industry. According to data compiled by Horizon, by 2030 the androgenetic alopecia market in the UK is expected to reach a projected revenue of £165 million. Beyond the dry statistics, we will all have spotted that more men are taking an interest in their body image, the way they present themselves and their hair.
I've been tracking changes in male body image for over a decade now — from the now quaint-seeming days of the 'metrosexual' through to his pumped-up successor the 'spornosexual', who is part sports star, part porn star, these days exemplified by the action-figure physiques of the lads on Love Island, Too Hot to Handle and [insert reality TV show of your choice]. These days young men are embracing a whole range of aesthetic procedures with increasing amounts of enthusiasm — and not just hair transplants. These have become de rigueur since the unlikely hero Wayne Rooney struck a blow for demystification with a casual 2011 tweet — 'Just to confirm to all my followers I have had a hair transplant. I was going bald at 25 why not. I'm delighted with the result.' And when I was training with a PT, a cheerful young Portuguese man named Mario, he explained he frequently went to have PRP — 'platelet-rich plasma' — injections in his scalp. Mario had absolutely no signs of hair thinning, and in fact had a long and magnificent ponytail. So was that because of his canny utilisation of PRP treatment? Or was he simply a 26-year-old needlessly injecting his head with his own blood? Who's to say.
Having swiftly agreed to Ouronyx's offer of a consultation, a blood panel is taken and a trichoscopy is performed, capturing highly detailed imagery of my hair follicles. The images show my terminal hairs (which are, counterintuitively, the 'good' ones, ie thicker and stronger) and my vellus hairs (finer and thinner).
I am, it transpires, a 'perfect candidate' for micrografting. Generally robust of hairline, but with some telltale signs of thinning around the temples (Ha! My teenage self has been vindicated!) that could perhaps be paused, or even reversed, if we were to act swiftly. I could, if I choose, experience AMT first hand.
'But don't worry,' Nicoloso says. 'It's not invasive.'
Jump cut to the following Monday, and I'm having a small piece of my scalp removed.
Although I am not a branding expert, I suspect there is probably a fairly strong commercial argument for why the procedure is called 'micrografting' and not 'having 40 injections into your scalp while your head is smacked with a small vibrating stick'.
For that, in truth, is what the AMT procedure consists of. It begins with a local anaesthetic in the back of one's head — the site where a three-punch biopsy promptly takes place.
This matter is then taken away and whirred up into a soup consisting of 'injecting growth factors, autologous exosomes and stem cells'. This nutritious broth is then injected into one's scalp, a process rendered slightly less injectiony via the use of a vibrating T-Bar, which lightly taps the scalp to distract you as the injections take place. If you have had acupuncture it isn't miles away from that experience. It's not 'pleasant' in the conventional sense of the word, but it's also not truly painful. And, in the soothing environs of the Ouronyx treatment room (in which you could conceivably be on some sort of benevolent alien planet), the procedure goes by in a flash.
And then it's done. My own matter has been reinfused into my scalp — and, as I type, my hitherto frail vellus hairs may well be midway through a transformation into terminal hairs of the most vigorous and alpha sort. In the meantime, Ouronyx offers micrograftees like myself a robust programme of continuing care (remember, it's like diabetes), including supplements, special shampoo and stimulation with a mysterious-sounding Energy Device that uses acoustic pressure waves, microdermal stimulation and LED therapy.
AMT has produced some impressive results, but, as Nicoloso stresses, it's not an exact science — hair-growth cycles, and the ebb and flow of one's natural hormones, all affect things. External factors play a part too, including stress, lifestyle and how tightly one wears one's H&M train driver's hat.
I thank the team at Ouronyx and head back out into St James's, with a slightly sore scalp and a small plaster on the back of my head. Now it's simply a case of waiting to see what happens.
Before too long I'll return to Ouronyx for a follow-up — for more ultra-detailed photos of my hair and to find out if the AMT was worth a trip to the ATM.
Perhaps my hair will have grown denser. Or perhaps it won't, and I'll have to confront the possibility of one day losing it all — and maybe, this time, actually coming to terms with it. Either way, it will be a period of personal growth.
Although, having said that, if Ouronyx could next develop some sort of magic pill to naturally reverse my rapid greying, that would be ideal.
The Ouronyx annual hair plan, which includes nutritional advice and continuing scalp health checks via diagnostic mapping, blood tests and targeted supplements and tailored hair care, costs £7,000,
Max Olesker is a comedian and contributing editor at Esquire.
