An introduction to Micrografting, the popular hair transplant surgery

Updated on June 19, 2019

Young men and women suffering from hair loss problems can seek professional advice and guidance in hair transplant NYC to understand how they can benefit from the technique of Micrografting for hair transplant.  Micrografting is a hair transplant surgery that involves implanting donor hair to a recipient suffering from hair loss. The surgeon will extract the hair grafts from the donor site comprising of the fringe around the back of the head and then insert it into the bald area of the scalp of the recipient. The downside of this method is that it leaves large circular scars at the back of the head and there might be unsightly tufts of newly grown hair looking like corn rows that could make people unhappy. However, new techniques are now available that provides improved graft preparation method and does away with the problems.

Your choices

You can either go for micrografting comprising of 1 or 2 hairs or a minigrafting comprising of 3 to 4 hairs. To take care of the varied hair density at different areas of the scalp, the technique inserts larger graft at the back of the scalp and gradually thinning the density by inserting smaller grafts towards the front of the head for maintaining a natural appearance. If it is necessary to insert grafts at the center of the scalp, then minigrafting is most suited.

The procedure

Your hair transplant surgeon will appraise you about things to do before and after surgery. Massaging your scalp before surgery and stopping medications like anti-inflammatory drugs and beta-blockers are pre-surgical requirements. The surgeon injects an anesthetic to the donor area to numb and to make the process pain-free the surgeon might recommend a mild sedative or use a spray on the area.

By making a linear incision at the donor area, the surgeon removes a thin layer of skin containing the follicular units and then stitch up the area for healing. After anesthetizing the scalp, the surgeon drills a number of semi-circular holes on the scalp in the area of the transplant by using a micro-blade or micro-needle, but there is no bleeding. The drilling pattern ensures that there is space left between the incisions, and it replicates the pattern of natural hair growth.  The surgeon uses an implanter pen or micro tweezers for inserting the graft into the scalp up to a depth of 1 mm.

The experience

The time taken to complete the procedure depends on the number of grafts to be inserted and can take between 2 and 8 hours. The process can be painful at various stages from the time of anesthetizing the scalp and during the insertion. The kind of pain experienced varies between people. Some bruising and swelling might also happen around the forehead, which subsides on applying ice pack. 

Micrografting has been in use for many years, but its popularity is waning ever since the techniques of hair implanting by using FUT (Follicular unit transplantation), and FUE (Follicular unit extraction) started gaining popularity. However, there should not be any doubt about the effectiveness of the procedure. 

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