The Night and Morning after the hair transplant Surgery

One of the most common patient concerns after any surgery is what he or she will feel like afterward. What you experience after hair transplant surgery depends somewhat on which procedure you have, strip harvesting or FUE.

Strip harvesting: Single strip harvesting removes the donor tissue as a single strip or oval, and then technicians divide it into smaller sections using a dissecting stereo-microscope to minimize damage to the follicles.

• Pain: When you leave the surgical office after a procedure involving strip harvesting, you shouldn’t feel any pain for about six hours. Doctors usually administer a long-acting anesthetic when you leave that keeps you pain-free for this period. When the anesthesia wears off, you may have a dull ache in the area where the donor strip was taken. About 95 percent of patients tolerate this discomfort well, but you’ll get narcotics in pill form to take home, and we strongly urge you to take one along with a sleep aid when you go to sleep so that you’re able to get some rest.

One out of every 200 to 300 patients experience considerable pain on the night of surgery, probably resulting from muscle spasms in the incision area. Your surgeon should give you enough pain medication for this rare occurrence, and you may want to put ice on the bandaged incision area for pain relief. Also, you should be given a travel-type neck pillow for properly positioning the head at home. The pain will usually subside by morning.

• Bandaging and bleeding: You’ll leave the office with a 1-inch band wrapped around your head, like a tennis sweat band. This puts gentle pressure over the surgical wound, which sometimes bleeds slightly under this bandage. Some bleeding may occur because the longacting anesthetics contain adrenaline, which constricts blood vessels. Generally, gentle pressure for about ten minutes usually stops any bleeding, but if there’s any excessive bleeding, be sure to call your doctor.

• Next day follow-up: Doctors generally like to see you the next morning to administer the first hair wash, which is done more aggressively than you may feel comfortable doing yourself. The goal is to clean off all blood and scabs; many patients walk out after the hair wash with minimal redness or indications that a hair transplant was done. The post-surgical hair wash by the surgical staff isn’t a necessity, but if you do it yourself, make sure you follow the washing instructions carefully. Your doctor may supply a video to make the process easier for you to understand and follow.

Follicular unit extraction (FUE): In the FUE procedure, each follicular unit is removed one at a time. The wounds are less than 1mm each and they are not sutured as they are left open. The wounds swell and often close on their own in a day or two. If they crust, the scabs are very small. Bleeding is usually minimal and healing is very fast, usually in less than a week.

• Pain: The best part of an FUE is that there’s often no significant pain after the surgery. Patients receive pain medications, but these are rarely needed. The ache that occurs in strip harvesting procedures is rarely present.

• Bandaging and bleeding: The wounds from where the grafts were taken are left open and hidden under a baseball hat or bandana. Significant bleeding rarely occurs because the wounds are so small. No bandages are used.

• Next day follow-up: Most patients have the option of revisiting the office so that the surgical staff can perform the first post-surgical hair wash, but it’s not a necessity following this type of harvesting.

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The Night and Morning after the hair transplant Surgery

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