Are you getting trap in FUT VS FUE battle. When somebody decides to undergo a hair transplant surgery, this question comes to the mind of a lot of people. But these days there are many people who have already decided that they know everything as all the research which they probably did, was leading them to that particular surgery as everyone was saying that this is the best.
We hereby would take the opportunity to tell you that for a good hair transplant surgeon both FUT & FUE are like his children. He would love both techniques equally. Make both of them your trusted & reliable partner in the happy journey of hair restoration.
In a high grade of baldness, or even in early grades of baldness, in case of progressive baldness, one has to make use of Both techniques. One technique alone will not solve the purpose.
Important Aspect Of Taking Decision For FUE & FUT
- Donor area: As we know we are born with a limited & fixed donor. That is your asset which is more important than money. A bald person would like to make the maximum use of his available donor area. It is not possible to use the entire donor area with one method alone. It has to be a combination of FUT hair transplant & FUE hair transplant. Even if your current requirement can be met, it doesn’t mean that you might not need it in the coming years. So judicious use of donors can only be ensured by a surgeon who is competent & confident with both the techniques & with years of experience & an intent to help.
- No. of grafts: Generally FUT surgery gives us a good chunk of grafts from a small area without compromising the donor density. For the same number of grafts by FUE, we might need to involve the unsafe donor zone, if the required number is high. Generally, people who come to us for repair hair transplant, quote a very high number of grafts which is not possible & obviously not showing in their results as well. The number of grafts that we can take out by FUE in most of the Asian cases with good density is 2500- 3000 (this is on the higher side) in many cases even that number is also not possible. The density in the donor area is also compromised in the case of FUE, which is not disturbed at all in the case of FUT.
- Graft survival rate: FUT gives us grafts with better fat cushioning & are more resilient & can survive any trauma better than FUE grafts which are more fragile. So the graft survival rate of FUT is always better than FUE.
Difference Between FUT & FUE Hair Transplant
- Scarring of donor: Scarring is also a major concern for people & a lot of myths have been propagated. As far as FUT surgery is concerned scar is a major issue, but because of the trichophytic closure technique, the scar is very minimal & barely visible. Even with a very short hairstyle in most cases, the scar is not visible. People also think that FUE is a scarless surgery which again is a myth. There are many dotted scars in the donor area after FUE, so when you keep very short hair they can be visible & most of the time more visible than FUT scars. Even if the scar of FUT is visible, we can put some FUE grafts in it & hide it completely. Scalp micropigmentation is also one of the options to cover the scar.
- Density: Which method gives more density, FUE or FUT? This is one of the most common questions which people ask. FUE surgery gives us the option to choose multiple grafts, where we can cherrypick grafts with more hair in them. This is not possible in the case of FUT. In FUT we cut a strip and whatever is present in that area, comes out. So FUE can give more density in a given area, than FUT. But that also means that we were consuming higher currency notes earlier and will be left with a lesser follicle/ graft ratio for future use.
- Pain: Many people think that FUT is a big surgery & it would pain a lot. So let us tell you that intra-op pain in FUT is much less as compared to FUE because we have to make a very small area numb in FUT & the procedure is also 40-50 minutes
So for the same number of grafts in case of FUE we get more hair than FUT. For example if we are doing 2000 grafts by FUE, due to cherry picking the multiplication factor in FUE would be somewhere around 2.5, which means 5000 hair. For the same number of grafts in case of FUT the multiplication factor would be somewhere around 1.5, which means for 2000 grafts we will be getting around 3000 hair. So the comparison between the results of FUE & FUT would be unfair & misleading.
There are still a lot of multi grafts are left in the donor of FUT, because that area is untouched, which means we can use these grafts later when required. This calculation will be reversed in case of 2nd FUE being done from the same donor area.
Conclusion
FUT and FUE, both the surgeries are important tools in the hands of an experienced surgeon, which he can use to make his patient’s life beautiful. Any comparison between the two with an intent to malign one and glorify the other is not ethical. A patient should choose a surgeon who is competent in doing both the surgeries because in case of progressive baldness, both the surgeries will be needed.
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