Hair Restoration with PRF

Hair restoration injections with your own platelet-rich fibrin (PRF) can be very beneficial in stimulating the remaining hair follicles to grow.

At Mountcastle Plastic Surgery, we offer platelet-rich fibrin (PRF) for hair loss because it is a natural treatment that uses your body’s own growth factors. PRF can stimulate the hair follicles, which then encourages new hair regrowth, and reduces the process of thinning hair. A small blood sample is taken, and this blood is then placed in our centrifuge. When centrifugation is complete, the patient’s plasma will be separated from the red blood cells. The PRF that contains concentrated amounts of growth factors is extracted from the blood sample and injected into the patient’s scalp where the hair is thinning. As the skin begins its wound-healing process, these growth factors are present in the follicular bulge area where stem cells are found. This activates the proliferative phase of the hair cycle, resulting in new, denser, and healthier hair growth.

Patient selection is critical for success. Some patients are not candidates for this treatment if they have advanced AGA (Norwood V-VII or Ludwig III). This includes patients with traumatic alopecia and autoimmune alopecia, as they may have insufficient adnexal normal tissue to mount an adequate response.

The concern with autoimmune alopecia is that even if the healing cascade is stimulated and anagen prolonged, the baseline autoimmune etiology may counter treatment efforts. Contraindications for treatment with PRF include significant platelet dysfunctions; hypofibrinogenemia; local infection or septicemia; pregnancy; poor blood clotting; keloid-prone patients; sensitivity to bovine thrombin—if used; and hemodynamic instability.

Prior to treatment, it is recommended for patients to have blood work done. Blood work test including CBC with platelets; serum iron; and estrogen, testosterone, thyroid, pituitary, and antibody panels.