Chemotherapy hair loss
Losing Hair to Cancer
For many women fighting against cancer, hair is a crucial battleground. It is easy for you to hide the loss of your cervix, your uterus, or even one of your breasts. But when you lose your hair to cancer treatment, everybody notices. You want to appear strong. You have to be strong. For your husband, for your kids, and especially for yourself.
Why people with Cancer lose hair
Not everyone one with cancer or undergoing cancer treatment will experience alopecia or hair loss. It depends on the type of cancer that you have and the treatment that you receive:
• Certain forms of leukemia and lymphoma have alopecia as part of their symptoms.
• Poor appetite and weight loss that often accompany cancer may lead to deficiency in vitamins and minerals that causes your hair to become dry, brittle, and susceptible to damage. Inadequate nutrition eventually causes poor hair growth.
• Chemotherapy works by killing rapidly dividing cells in your body. Ideally, this should only target cancer cells. Unfortunately, even your normal hair follicles multiply at a fast rate, and so they are destroyed with your cancer cells. The extent of hair loss varies with each chemo drug. It also varies from one patient to another, even if they have the same medication. Some chemo drugs cause very little hair loss, if at all, while others may cause you to lose hair in other body parts, including eyebrows, eyelashes, and pubic hair.
• In contrast, radiation therapy only affects hair on the parts of your body where radiation is applied. Hence, you will not lose scalp hair for breast irradiation, but you can for expect to go bald if you undergo radiation for a brain tumor. The frequency and amount of radiation also determine the extent of your hair loss.
• Hormones like tamoxifen for breast cancer may lead to thinning of your hair.
Coping with cancer hair loss
Losing your hair can be devastating. However, since hair loss usually manifests weeks after the initial treatment, there are ways to help you prepare for it:
• Before starting any cancer treatment, do not hesitate to ask your oncologist about how treatment will affect your day-to-day living. They’ll tell you if your medications include those that can cause hair loss.
• Understand that hair replacement technology is so advanced these days- they can make your hair replacement so natural looking- that nobody would even notice. Ronnie Talent, CEO of Legacy Hair Center, explains:” A few years ago, you would simply get a cheap synthetic wig from the American Cancer Society, which would look fake, and feel scratchy. We’re able to offer the exact technology that they use in Hollywood, using some of the finest silky hair on earth, that offers the patient to look however they want to look. We’ve had many patients tell us they prefer the hair replacement to how they own hair used to look!”
• If you decide to go the hair replacement route- contact a hair replacement center before you start chemo. They will take pictures, measurements and hair samples, so they can have your hair replacement ready – when you need it. “The length of time it takes really depends on the amount of customization. We can usually help people within 2-4 weeks, in most cases, Says Talent, whose center in located in Charlotte.
• Cut your hair short before starting chemotherapy. It will help you gradually get used to having less hair. Losing short hair strands is also less traumatic than finding clumps of long hair on your pillow or in your shower drain.
• Use mild shampoo and a soft hairbrush to gently care for your remaining hair. Protect your hair from excessive sunlight and use a comfortable pillow to decrease hair loss at night.
Hair loss related to cancer is usually temporary. In most cases, you may expect hair to grow back 1 month after the last chemotherapy session. For brain irradiation, it may take longer at about 6 months.
You can win this battle. The treatments available in the past few years offer so much hope- hope that wasn’t available not long ago. Don’t worry about the hair- you can get through this looking the way you want to look.
Legacy Hair Center specializes in the best hair restoration and hair replacement options for both men and women. You don’t have to suffer from alopecia. Visit the center in Charlotte, North Carolina and be among the thousands of people that Legacy has helped reach their hair restoration goals.
