Overview

What Are Hair Disorders and Hair Loss Prevention?

Hair disorders and hair loss can occur to anyone at any age for a variety of reasons. Most people have as many as 100,000 hairs on their head, shedding 50 to 100 hairs daily. Each hair on your head grows for about two to six years, with scalp hair growing about one-half inch a month. Approximately 90 percent of the hair on your scalp grows continually, with about 10 percent of your hair in a resting phase lasting two to three months. There are three major types of hair loss:

  • Male-pattern baldness
  • Female-pattern baldness
  • Alopecia

Hair loss has many causes, some of which cannot be cured. Northwestern Medicine head and neck surgeons1 offer surgical treatment options hair loss with no known cure.

Our specialists also offer hair loss prevention strategies that focus on making lifestyle changes to ensure that your hair stays as plentiful and healthy as possible.

Related Resources

Alopecia During Cancer Treatment

La Alopecia Durante el Tratamiento de Cáncer

American Academy of Dermatology



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In the spirit of keeping you well-informed, some of the physician(s) and/or individual(s) identified are neither agents nor employees of Northwestern Memorial HealthCare or any of its affiliate organizations. They have selected our facilities as places where they want to treat and care for their private patients.