Printer friendly page
Email this articleHair loss big topic, especially for a Vancouver conference of world scientists
E-mail this article | Print this page
By Camille Bains
VANCOUVER (CP) - Whether it's long, short, poker straight or bushy enough to be mistaken for a bird's nest, one thing's for sure - losing your hair packs an emotional wallop.
And that has spawned a $7-billion-a-year industry in North America as people shell out big bucks for hair transplants, a plethora of lotions, potions and clinically tested drugs that promise to restore their locks.
Scientists from around the world are meeting in Vancouver this week at the fifth International Congress on Hair Research.
Until Saturday, they'll discuss hair loss involving diet and stress, a disease that strips hair from men, women and children, chemotherapy-induced hair loss, stem cell therapy, hair surgery and even hirsutism or excessive hair growth.
Dr. Kevin McElwee, a research scientist with a doctoral degree in hair biology, works at the Hair Research Laboratory - part of Vancouver General Hospital's Skin Care Centre.
McElwee says people have such an emotional attachment to their hair that they'll try just about anything.
"It's just so common, about 60 to 70 per cent of the world's population experiences pattern baldness," he said. "It affects women as well - 40 per cent of women to some extent."
No treatment is completely effective, says McElwee, although men who start using one of the two most common drugs early on seem to have the best results.
But side effects like sexual impotency don't go over well for people who are trying to restore their youth and sexuality with a full head of hair.
McElwee has tried one of the drugs but says the results weren't good enough for him to keep taking it every day for the rest of his life.
"I was involved in some of the drug trials, so I was one of the guinea pigs," he says.
"After a time I succumbed like most people do. I was getting tired of using these treatments every day, day in, day out. Once you start you've got to keep going."
So after missing a dose of the drug for a day here, a week there, McElwee decided to call it quits.
"I'm 37 and to keep going (taking the drug) for another 20, 30 years just doesn't seem very appealing. Perhaps to some extent I adjusted to the idea that I was going to go bald and I was more willing to accept that."
McElwee says while the causes of baldness remain a mystery one thing's clear: it's becoming more common.
And that's leading scientists to believe environmental factors are involved, along with genetics from either side of a person's family.
McElwee says that while men may be more accepting of losing their hair, for women the very idea is so traumatic that some choose not to undergo chemotherapy when they're diagnosed with cancer so they can keep their crowning glory.
McElwee, who is also a professor in the University of British Columbia's dermatology and skin science department, focuses his research on alopecia areata, an auto immune disease - like rheumatoid arthritis - where the immune system targets hair follicles.
People with the disease - including men, women and children as young as eight - sometimes have a few bald patches on their heads or can lose all their hair, including eyelashes.
"There's a lot of emotion tied up with losing hair and with alopecia areata you can actually lose the hair very quickly so you can go from full, normal hair to universal hair loss in a matter of a couple of months."
McElwee's lab is focusing on stress as a factor in the disease, for which there are several support groups, including a summer camp for kids in the United States.
The hottest topic in hair research currently is tissue engineering, which involves the growth and culturing of stem cells from hair follicles.
Studies are being conducted to change the cells into muscle and nerve cells because compared to stem cells from other organs including the liver or kidney, ones from hair follicles are easily accessible.
Scientists are also researching whether implanting the cells into bald heads can generate hair growth.
Source: CP via Yahoo! Canada NewsAll rights reserved.