Eyebrow Transplantation

Eyebrow transplantation is an excellent treatment option for those with thin or missing eye brows due to plucking, shaving, burns, scars, and many other reasons.  The process of eyebrow transplantation uses your own hair from the back of your head which is then transplanted into your eyebrows to either fill out thin eyebrows or to build entirely new eyebrows where they are missing.  These hairs will grow permanently, making eyebrow transplantation a permanent solution to the problem of thin or missing eyebrows.

About Eyebrow Transplantation

The process of eyebrow transplantation involves harvesting hair follicles from the back of your head using the FUE harvesting method where a rotating or oscillating punch is used to harvest individual follicular units for transplantation.  The grafts are harvested from the back of your head, in what’s known as the donor area, specifically because these hairs are resistant to DHT which is the hormone that causes hair to thin and to fall out in male pattern baldness.  These hairs will maintain the resistance to DHT when transplanted.  Additionally, the back of the head is the last area to thin in female pattern baldness, making this the ideal area to harvest grafts for both men and women. Once harvested, the follicular units, which contain a cluster of hairs that share blood vessels, nerves, glands, and muscles, are dissected down into their individual hairs and then the single hair grafts are transplanted into the eye brows.  This differs from hair transplantation on the scalp where follicular units are transplanted in their entirety.  While the transplantation of entire follicular units behind the hairline on the scalp helps create excellent hair density, using entire follicular units in more directly visible areas such as the hairline or the eyebrows is much more noticeable than using single hair grafts.  For this reason, only single hair grafts are used for eyebrow transplantation.  Once transplanted, the hair will grow just like your normal eyebrow hair and can even be trimmed and plucked in the same fashion.  

Benefits

Your eyebrows are one of your most important features when it comes to framing your face, expressing emotion, and using non-verbal communication.  They also serve the practical function, along with your eye lashes, of helping to keep dust and debris out of your eyes.  Eyebrows that are very thin or missing are very noticeable to others you interact with and rebuilding eye brows can help from a cosmetic standpoint, a communication standpoint, and a functional standpoint.  Eyebrow transplantation can also make people feel more confident and more attractive.

Candidates

Most patients seeking thicker eyebrows are good candidates for eyebrow transplantation.  This includes people with thin or missing eyebrows due to scars, burns, shaving, or plucking.   Certain scarring alopecias can also cause loss of eyebrows, and patients with these causes may be candidates for eyebrow transplantation once their scarring alopecia has been adequately treated.

Personal Consultation

If you are considering an eyebrow transplant, Dr. O’Dea will provide a complimentary consultation to provide more information and to assess you individually as a candidate for the procedure, including evaluating your history of eyebrow hair loss and potential medical issues that may be contributing in order to provide you with the best possible care and to make the most appropriate plan for improving the fullness of your eyebrows.

Preparation

Preparation for eyebrow transplantation is fairly minimal.  Prescriptions will be sent to your pharmacy of choice so you can pick them up prior to the procedure and have them available after the procedure has been completed.  More preparation may be needed for those who take medications that may interfere with the surgery or for those with significant medical conditions.

Procedure

The process of performing an eyebrow transplantation is similar to that of an FUE hair transplant, just with a much smaller number of grafts.  First a surgical plan is made regarding the shape and location of the eyebrows using an erasable grease pencil until you are happy with the plan.  Once you are happy with the planned location and shape, a more permanent skin marker is used to mark the area.  Next, the harvest will begin.  A small area will be shaved in the back of the head where the harvest will take place.  While in FUE surgery the entire back of the head is shaved to allow for a harvest of often 2000 – 3000 grafts, for eyebrow transplantation a much smaller area can be shaved, and it can be shaved in a long, narrow strip that is easily covered by hair above for those with long hair.  Then local anesthesia will be administered to allow for the grafts to be harvested.  Grafts are harvested using the FUE harvesting technique, where a rotating cylindrical punch is used to harvest individual follicular units.  These follicular units are then dissected down into their individual hair follicles under a microscope to create single hair grafts.  Following the creation of single hair grafts, the recipient area in the eyebrows is anesthetized and small incisions are made for placement of the grafts.  This step of making the incisions, coupled with the initial planning phase, is the most important part of the procedure.  Care is taken to add natural curves and minor imperfections to provide you with the most natural appearing eyebrows possible.  This way, once it is healed people will not be able to notice that you’ve had a transplant.  Following the creation of the recipient sites, the single hair grafts are transplanted by hand into the incisions.

Recovery

Following the procedure, you will have some degree of bruising and swelling of the eye brows that will last several days and may occasionally cause you to have black eyes.  All of this is normal and will resolve with time.  The transplanted grafts must be protected for the first several days as it is easy to accidentally pull them out within this time period.  They become much more difficult to accidentally pull out after around three days.  The grafts will form a crust around three to five days after surgery and that crust will fall off after around seven to ten days after the surgery.  Once the crust has fallen off you can resume all normal activities.  

Results

Once healed from the surgery, your eyebrows will grow just like the rest of your hair. 

Cost of Non-Surgical Hair Restoration in 

The cost of eyebrow transplants depends on many different factors.  Please contact to schedule a consultation with Dr. O’Dea for further information.

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