COVID HAIR LOSS EXPLAINED // REGROWTH & RECOVERY// DERMATOLOGIST @DrDrayzday

well hey guys if you're new here welcome my name is andrea i'm a board-certified dermatologist and in this video i'm going to be talking all about covet hair loss why so many people are reporting hair loss since the cova 19 pandemic what type of hair loss is it how long does it last what can you expect and what are the treatment options there are multiple factors related to the copin 19 pandemic outside of even just viral infection that create the perfect storm for an uptick in the number of cases of hair loss in the majority of cases the type of hair loss that is occurring in people is something called a telogen effluvium it is a type of hair loss where the hair cycle shifts around so that you have an increase in shedding it's not actual true hair loss and that the hairs that you shed eventually will grow back however it is incredibly distressing to experience a telogen effluvium now it's normal to shed about a hundred hairs a day but when you are experiencing a telogen effluvium you can be shedding hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and that's coming out in your brush it's clogging up your drain it's very unsettling telogen effluvium can also be accompanied by scalp discomfort and scalp pain this is referred to as trichodinia pain to the touch of the scalp or pain with combing or brushing your hair now telogen effluvium is certainly not unique to the pandemic it can happen with basically any stressful event surgery fever different medications pregnancy psychological stress physical stress any type of stress can trigger a telogen effluvium basically shifting upwards of 70 of your hairs into the shedding phase of the hair cycle that's called telogen here's the thing about telogen effluvium that can make it very confusing to people experiencing it in that it doesn't start until roughly three to four months after you have experienced that stressful event so you may have actually forgotten about what you went through or you know it's not at the forefront of your mind but with the pandemic that continues to be at the forefront of everyone's mind regardless it takes time for the hairs to begin shedding and once they start shedding that can last for many many months in contrast to some other types of hair loss out there the shedding that you experience with telogen effluvium it is diffuse meaning it comes from all over your scalp it's not just like one or two patches it's not just thinning in a specific area it is diffuse shedding and so that in and of itself is really distressing hair is coming out everywhere the good news is that provided the stressful event goes away and you are no longer going through that stressful event in the vast majority of cases the telogen effluvium will slow down after anywhere from six to nine months which is a long time to be dealing with a lot of shedding but it will slow down and stop and your hair will return to its normal growth cycle pattern however in some cases the telogen effluvium can unmask another type of hair loss called androgenetic alopecia otherwise known as male pattern balding or female pattern hair loss seen in both men and women it's related to your genetics but having a telogen effluvium can kick off and unmask an underlying androgenetic alopecia telogen effluvium persisting greater than six months is referred to as chronic telogen effluvium and this can happen because you are still exposed to a stressful event keeping the hair cycle pushed towards the shedding phase but in many cases upwards of 33 we never really identify the underlying cause of chronic telogen effluvium so why are so many people with the pandemic experiencing this type of hair loss telogen effluvium hair shedding well if you are happy to get sick with the virus there you go viral illness is a well-established trigger for a telogen effluvium it's very stressful and this particular viral infection we're learning a lot more about its mechanisms and pathophysiology of the different disease manifestations so there are some theories as to why this particular viral infection how it may contribute additionally to telogen effluvium the severity of the viral infection definitely will dictate the extent of telogen effluvium the more severe of an infection the more likely you are to have a more persistent telogen effluvium lasting longer if you've been hospitalized and then you have other factors that go along with the treatment of this viral infection that also can impact the hair cycle namely medications that may be given as treatments if you're in the hospital you may be given medications that are blood thinners that these can affect the hair cycle just being in the hospital alone however can lead to a telogen effluvium because being in the hospital is very stressful especially if you happen to be in the icu intensive care unit yeah i mean getting admitted to the icu is almost a recipe for a telogen effluvium so the medications themselves can impact the hair cycle causing you to later develop a telogen effluvium and then of course medications in the hospital they are started and stopped kind of abruptly as your as your you know hospital course changes and that starting and stopping can kind of you know confuse your hair cycle a bit and skew things more towards a telogen effluvium but here's the thing about the hair loss that people are experiencing related to the pandemic you don't even necessarily need to have had the infection to experience a telogen effluvium because this whole pandemic has multiple other associated factors with the telogen effluvium it is incredibly stressful with the lockdowns many people experience severe psychological stress related to maybe job insecurity and that psychological stress can contribute to a telogen effluvium and it's not going to present until you know several months after you've been under stress so maybe things have picked up for you and you're now your hair is shedding a lot it should resolve but maybe you are still under chronic stress and you're continuing to lose hair so it definitely can be something that ends up being more of a chronic shedding another thing that certainly contributes to the hair loss that we are seeing the telogen effluvium is disruption and sleep this was reported by many many many people that the pandemic the lockdowns and whatnot due to probably stress and what have you contributed to poor quality sleep when you have poor quality sleep that in and of itself can lead to a telogen effluvium it also can contribute to exacerbation of any underlying psychological symptoms like anxiety and depression underneath all that you can have a little chemical called substance p that gets released now substance p it is released from the little nerves in our skin and it contributes to the onslaught of neuroinflammation substance p is what is thought to be responsible for perhaps developing symptoms of trichodinia pain on touch of the scalp that can occur with telogen effluvium as well as psychological stress and that substance p in and of itself may actually end up disrupting the hair cycle as well so simply being at home stressed out having a poor sleep cycle well that also can lead to telogen effluvium comment share in the comments below how your stress levels have been during this whole pandemic i think it can really help people out to kind of understand that everybody's kind of going through this you're not alone and the pandemic was sort of the perfect storm of factors to really contribute not only to emotional stress poor sleep but hair loss i mean hair loss is just kind of a manifestation of all these things the good news is that the hair can return to normal growth now as i mentioned at the beginning of the video if you have an underlying genetic predisposition to what's called androgenetic alopecia in some cases the telogen effluvium can unmask that and so you may note that your hair remains thinner than it was pre-telogen effluvium so hair loss due to the pandemic is most likely a telogen effluvium in the majority of cases either due to viral infection itself or simply the psychological emotional stress of being in a pandemic so what should you do if you're experiencing hair loss maybe related to the pandemic or you're just not quite sure my number one tip is to see a board-certified dermatologist there are a variety of other underlying medical conditions that could be responsible there are many different types of hair loss out there so don't attempt to be your own diagnostician go see a board certified dermatologist blood work may be needed a scalp exam is very important to the evaluation of hair loss sometimes we pull at the hair to count the number of shedding hairs and look at them under the microscope a scalp biopsy can be incredibly informative and if needed appropriate treatment can be initiated i have to warn you guys though that because so many people are experiencing this type of hair loss right now it is a prime opportunity for companies to begin marketing to you quick fixes remedies etc that are not necessarily going to help you that are not rooted in evidence for efficacy things like hair gummies vitamins supplements if you haven't checked it out already i do have a video on hair loss supplements and remember from my videos that biotin and high levels of biotin it's not actually shown to help regrow the hair there are a lot of hair regrowth serums out there that tout botanic ingredients i don't recommend those either again remember in the majority of cases if this is a type of hair loss you are experiencing it's distressing to go through for sure but with time the hair will go back to normal so you don't need to drop a bunch of money on supplements that are not rooted in science to help you and again it's going to likely resolve on its own now i have videos on treatments for hair loss things like minoxidil and low level laser but in the case of telogen effluvium especially related to a viral infection these treatments are controversial for example if you'll recall from my videos on minoxidil it actually triggers a telogen effluvium in the beginning and it's so it's not probably going to be the best thing for you of course discuss with your dermatologist it is an fda approved treatment for pattern androgenetic alopecia but it's controversial whether to use it or not in telogen effluvium and it's the kind of thing where you have to keep using it in order to maintain those results and do you actually need to put yourself through that you know there's a good chance you don't again i do heavily seeing a board-certified dermatologist there are a lot of types of hair loss out there and there are you know depending on the type of hair loss you have then these treatments may be helpful necessary and if you go to a dermatologist and they brush you off they don't give you know they don't take you seriously they don't take your hair loss seriously find another dermatologist because hair loss is bread and butter dermatology all dermatologists should be able to evaluate hair loss i mean it's like you know going to going to a pediatrician and them not being able to like evaluate your child for their developmental milestones i mean hair loss is our bread and butter and we're honestly the only specialty that really has the extensive training and evaluation and management of hair loss now of course there are dermatologists who are sub specialists in different things and that's not going to be necessarily in their wheelhouse but a general dermatologist should be able to evaluate hair loss and importantly should know to take it seriously because again this is our bread and butter of our specialty so if you don't feel like you're being heard like your hair loss is being dismissed find another dermatologist for sure and i know it can be difficult but it's definitely important because a proper evaluation getting the right diagnosis it can make a tremendous difference for you long term and you don't need to waste your time with somebody who's not going to take you seriously hair loss like i said hair loss is really emotionally taxing draining distressing it is what nightmares are made of a lot of people have actually a recurrent nightmare that their hair all their hair falls out so when you experience this it is psychologically distressing especially if you don't know what's going on you don't know how long it's going to last i do think doing something can give you a sense of control which can help your emotional health so i suggest trying to focus on sleep quality and i know that's frustrating to hear like oh yeah sleep how important is it but remember what i said earlier the sleep cycle that's important for healing recovery and if you don't get good quality sleep well that increases the levels of those inflammatory neuroinflammatory mediators that generate more inflammation can jeopardize the health of the hair follicle and also contribute to emotional distress psychological distress that further fuels the fire for telogen effluvium so don't underestimate the power of sleep and the sleep cycle and things that you can do proactively to help get your sleep back on track are sticking to a sleep routine going to bed at the same time every night waking up the same time every morning turning off devices a few hours before you go to bed because remember that blue light keeps your brain active and it gets in the way of you actually naturally falling asleep and you know don't eat a large meal before bed i have another video which i'll link down below on my tips for beauty sleep where i give a lot of these tips and i really do want to emphasize to you guys that this is an area in your life that you could at least focus on in the meantime it's not going to harm you to focus on getting better sleep so sleep is something that you can focus on and i do personally think especially depending on your personality type sometimes just having something that you feel you have ownership and contr some degree of control over i think it can be a huge emotional relief and over these past you know couple of years during the pandemic a lot of people have felt a sense of you know like they have no control over things and so focusing on how can i get better sleep that's something like a little project that you can work on that will benefit your total health your emotional health and may help out your hair loss cause i hope this video was helpful to you guys in clarifying the nature of hair loss as it relates to the pandemic and covid19 i know this time has been emotionally draining for everyone and hair loss on top of that is like just another thing to stress you out so if you enjoyed this video please give it a thumbs up share it with your friends and as always don't forget sunscreen and subscribe i'll talk to you guys tomorrow bye [Music] you

Channel: Dr Dray

Views: 279,003

Keywords: covid hair loss, covid hair loss remedy, covid hair loss regrowth, covid hair loss treatment, covid hair loss recovery, covid hair loss female, post covid hair loss, post covid hair loss treatment, post covid hair loss remedy, post covid hair fall, post covid hair loss recovery, post covid hair, post covid hair loss home remedy, post covid hair growth, dr dray hair loss, dr dray hair growth, dr dray post covid hair loss, hair loss after covid 19

Id: P8Ygwl4Ohig

Length: 15min 46sec (946 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 02 2021