Hair Loss Medicine

Finasteride is an antiandrogen drug that was originally used to treat enlarged prostates (benign prostatic hyperplasia). It happened only relatively recently in the early 1990s that its hair growth promoting properties were discovered and a new dosage of 1mg finasteride a day approved by the US Food and Drug Administration for treating hereditary hair loss in male patients. In the past ten years or so finasteride has become accepted as the most effective treatment for male pattern baldness that has not been beaten by any other remedy to this date. The originally approved formulation was called Propecia but finasteride is now available as generic Propecia pills (1mg finasteride) at a much lower price than the original branded product. Since it uses the same active substance it is equally powerful as the branded form.

You can buy finasteride online in many pharmacies alongside a more expensive Propecia. It is only up to you which one you prefer, but do not be surprised if branded drug is several times more expensive than generic. The most economical option is to buy generic Proscar (5mg finasteride pills) and cut the pills in five equal pieces. Some rouge online pharmacies have been caught to sell sugar pills and it is therefore often said that you should avoid buying generic products since they are more likely to be fake. However, the experience of many consumers show that it is more often branded products rather than generics that are either copied or fake as their high profit margins are more likely to attract fraud. Nevertheless, when you decide on buying any medicinal drugs online use only pharmacies that have been well established and check their references and independent reviews. The price of the pills alone should not be the only decisive factor.

Hair loss is one of the most common health conditions affecting all races, age groups and both sexes. The common name describing all types of hair loss is alopecia. Alopecia can be caused by a number of factors and it can be temporary or permanent. The hair loss condition best known to most of us with its typical horseshoe balding pattern, affecting mostly male population, is genetically determined and it is called male pattern baldness. Its main cause is dihydrotestosterone (DHT), which is a metabolite of the male hormone testosterone attacking and destroying our hair follicles. DHT causes a slow death of hair follicles through their gradual miniaturization.

Male hormone testosterone is also present in female bodies so that women can also produce DHT and thus suffer from hereditary form of hair loss called female pattern baldness. Female pattern baldness does not have its characteristic horseshoe balding pattern as women are losing their hair around their entire scalp. Some women, however, can also be losing hair mainly on the top and in the front of their scalp. Female pattern baldness is, due to its diffuse balding pattern, more difficult to recognize than the male form of this disease.

It is often assumed that the main reason why somebody is losing their hair is the excessive amount of DHT in their body. However, this is not true. Women are also losing their hair and they definitely do not have too much DHT in their scalp. The main reason why somebody is losing hair is susceptibility of some hair follicles to the harmful attacks of DHT. It is not exactly known why hair in some people is more susceptible to these attacks than in others and why hair loss mainly affects the hair on the top and in the front of our scalp. Therefore, most treatments for male pattern baldness available today are focusing on protecting our hair follicles from DHT, be it through reducing the DHT levels in our scalp or binding to the receptor sites in hair follicles and thus preventing DHT from binding to them and causing harm.