Hair loss due to telogen effluvium is usually temporary, and your hair often grows back without treatment once you no longer have that stress. Androgenic alopecia (male pattern baldness and female pattern baldness) is a type of hair loss that's more gradual than telogen effluvium.
With telogen effluvium, it is common for hair to grow back within 3–6 months after managing the cause.
While the hair loss may be sudden, the process of regrowth is a slow one. But eventually, most people will experience full, or close to full, hair regrowth. And even during TE, most patients do NOT lose all of their hair. Instead, they experience all-over thinning of their hair.
Telogen effluvium is the name for a common cause of temporary hair loss due to the excessive shedding of resting or telogen hair after some shock to the system. New hair continues to grow. Telogen hair is also known as a club hair due to the shape of the root.
Whether you call them flyaways or baby hairs, the new hair regrowth will be short and unmanageable until it reaches a length where it can blend easily with the rest of your hair. Even though this sign of telogen effluvium regrowth is annoying, it's an indication that your hair is moving in the right direction!
Thus with this type of hair loss, hair falling out is a sign of hair regrowth. As the new hair first comes up through the scalp and pushes out the dead hair a fine fringe of new hair is often evident along the forehead hairline.
The use of a hair wash test (5 day modified hair wash test, or photos, or trichograms, or biopsies, or evaluation of hairs collected in the shower drain can help patient's and their doctors get a sense of whether or not shedding rates have returned back to normal.
A visible scalp through your hair can be a sign that it's thinning (but not always). The factors that contribute to thinning hair (and thus a visible scalp) include stress, diet, vitamin deficiency and ageing.
If the old hair has not been shed already, the new growing hair helps “push” the old hair out of the follicle. As the new hair grows out from the base of the follicle, it extends beyond the surface of the skin and appears as straight or curly, and with a color that can be blonde or brown or red or gray.
Telogen effluvium is a benign and spontaneously reversible condition with no associated complications. As it is a non-cicatricial alopecia, the scalp has no scarring, even during the active hair loss phase.
Whilst thinning hair caused by Male Pattern Baldness will not 'get thicker' again of its own accord, where Telogen Effluvium is the only issue, normal hair growth can resume without intervention so the hair should return to its previous density within approximately six months.
Telogen effluvium home remedies include consuming foods that are good for the hair, adopting a proper hair care regimen, following a good workout routine, and managing stress, as these factors account for a healthy lifestyle which is essential for hair and scalp health, as well as overall fitness.
As we've noted, damaged hair repair isn't possible because the protein bonds and cuticles have been permanently altered. Instead, the focus should be on maintaining hair to prevent further damage. If your hair is severely damaged, the most extreme solution is to cut it off and start fresh.
Most cases of Telogen Effluvium hair loss see significant improvement over the course of 6 to 9 months. Patients suffering from Androgenetic Alopecia hair loss, on the other hand, will usually see a worsening of hair density over a period of 12 months.
However, in some cases, particularly when the triggering factor persists or in chronic telogen effluvium, it can last for years. Does telogen effluvium change hair texture? Yes, TE can sometimes change hair texture, making regrown hair feel finer or different from the original hair.
As mentioned, there are many types of medical therapies, both biochemical and natural, that have been shown to have excellent results. There are only two FDA-approved medical therapies for use for AGA hair loss: oral finasteride for men and topical minoxidil for men and women.
Despite its popularity in the media and amongst consumers, biotin has no proven efficacy in hair and nail growth of healthy individuals. Only 1 study has shown decreased levels of biotin in healthy individuals, though this data was confounded by multiple factors, including patient history.
The normal duration of telogen is approximately 100 days (3 to 6 months) after which period the hair starts growing again. However, depending on the length of the hair, it may take many months for the overall hair volume to gradually return to normal.
The condition usually affects women over 40 years of age who complain of diffuse alopecia and may be misdiagnosed as having telogen effluvium, and has also been designated 'alopecia areata incognita' (yet another synonymous designation for the same condition proposed by Rebora [30] in 1987).
Hair shedding takes 3-6 months to cease, after which regrowth can be noted 3-6 months on removal of trigger, but cosmetically significant regrowth can take 12-18 months [14,15]. Stress is one of the major contributing factors for telogen effluvium.
If the triggering event is temporary—for example, if you recover from an illness or stop taking the medication causing the hair loss—your hair may grow back after six months. Telogen effluvium is considered chronic if hair loss lasts longer than six months.
Signs of telogen effluvium include seeing more hair than usual on your pillow, in the shower, or in your hairbrush. Your hair may appear thinner, though the hair loss is often subtle, and others may not notice the change.