Figuring out how to combat baldness and regrow hair may not be one of the most critical areas of medical research, but it's one of extremely high interest for millions of men and women. Now, researchers may have discovered a key piece of the puzzle.
Bald made a comeback years ago. Some men even shaving their heads before hair departed on its own, but many other say they would give anything to regrow their locks.
Now doctors say a big breakthrough could make that possible.
"This is definitely a step closer to finding a new way of treating hair loss," said Dr. George Costarelis, dermatologist.
While studying the cells of men undergoing hair transplants, Dr. Costarelis says he and his team made a surprising discovery.
"Which is that if the scalp that's bald still has the same number of stem cells as the scalp that's not bald," said Constarelis.
The problem is, even though the stem cells exist they aren't producing a different kind of cell called a progenator cell.
"These are the ones that are the work horse cells. They are constantly making the hair.
Costarelis says he is hopeful researchers will find a way to turn the inactive cells back on.
"We know the stem cells are present. They're not gone. If they gone it would be more difficult to design a treatment, but current treatments are very good at maintaining the hair you have. This one would be geared towards actually reversing hair loss. So even if you're bald, theoretically this would be able to activate the stem cells and get new hair to grow in," said Costarelis.
Doctors don't know if baldness in women works the same way, but if it does, Costarelis hopes the same principles will apply to curing female pattern hair loss also.
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