Male pattern baldness will develop in most men at some time. It is the most common kind of hair loss in men. It usually takes somewhere between 15 and 25 years to actually go bald. Some men can in fact go bald in less than 5 years. In the first stage of hair loss the hair begins to recede by thinning at the front of the head. The hair tends to get thin on the top of the head at the same time. This then leads to a bald patch developing in the middle of the scalp. The bald patch and the receding front of the scalp then gradually enlarge and eventually join together.
A rim of hair is usually left around the sides and back of the head. However, in some men even this goes thin and it eventually leads to a totally bald head. Nearly all men will have some degree of baldness by the time they are 60 years old. The actual age that hair loss starts seems to be quite variable. It has been shown that about a third of 30 year old men and half of all 50 year olds are quite bald. Women are not immune to baldness and some women can develop a similar pattern of hair loss to men. In women the hair loss tends to be shown as a general thinning across the whole of the scalp.
Hair is made in special areas of the scalp called hair follicles. These are like very small pouches under the skin. A hair will usually grow from a follicle for a total of about 3 years. This hair is then lost, but a new hair will grow from this same follicle. All hair follicles on the scalp go through this pattern of growth, loss and regrowth throughout the life of a person.
During the process of balding the affected hair follicles on the scalp steadily become smaller than normal. As the follicle reduces in size each new hair that is produced is thinner than the preceding one. Added to this is the fact that each new hair produced by these follicles grows for much less time than the usual 3 years. In the end the only thing remaining is a much smaller hair follicle with a thin stump of hair that doesn’t even reach the scalp surface.
The male hormone testosterone is involved in causing these changes. Despite this it has been shown that the levels of testosterone in men with baldness is the same as that in men not showing any balding. Hair follicles convert testosterone to another hormone called dihydrotestosterone. However, this in itself still doesn’t explain process of balding.
It is thought that hair follicles can become very sensitive to dihydrotestosterone and that it is this over sensitivity that leads to the hair follicle shrinking. Even this can’t be the total answer because it doesn’t explain why different hair follicles are affected at different times during this gradual process. Another problem is explaining why only scalp hairs are affected and not those in areas such as the armpit, groin and beard. It is therefore thought that other genetic factors must be involved in the process of male pattern baldness.
By: Timoteus Vincent
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