Pre-Made Recipient Sites, 2015 ISHRS Survey

Dr. Bernstein Presents “Pre-Made Recipient Incisions” at 2015 ISHRS Annual Scientific Meeting in Chicago

Presenting at the 23rd Annual Scientific Meeting of the International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery (ISHRS) in Chicago, Illinois, Dr. Bernstein detailed how making recipient site incisions before harvesting follicular unit grafts can improve the outcome of an FUE procedure.

For years, it was standard operating procedure in an FUE hair transplant to first harvest follicular units, then create recipient sites in the balding areas and finally place the extracted units into these sites. This practice persisted despite the fact that hair restoration physicians had known for years that prolonged periods of time outside the body decreased survival of follicular unit grafts. With the widespread adoption of FUE, and larger sessions being performed, Dr. Bernstein looked for ways to streamline the process.

By making the requisite number of recipient sites before harvesting, the grafts can be placed as soon as they are extracted from the donor area. This reduces the critical period of time that grafts are out of the body.

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ISHRS Survey: FUE & Robotic FUE Surging in Popularity

After years of relatively slow adoption since its introduction into the medical literature in 2002, Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE) is now experiencing unprecedented growth. In 2006, FUE represented only 7.4% of all hair transplant procedures performed world-wide with a growth rate of a mere 0.4% over the two-year period beginning in 2004. By 2014, 48.5% of all hair transplant procedures were performed using FUE, with a bi-annual growth rate of 16.3%, a 40-fold increase in growth over that earlier period.

The first robotic FUE procedures were performed using the ARTAS® System in late 2011, with only a handful of cases that year. By 2014, 12.6% of all hair transplants and 26% of all FUE cases were performed using automated devices. With the use of robotic devices increasing so rapidly (3 systems operating in 2011 and over 120 worldwide in 2015) the interest in robotic technology has expanded from researchers and a few physician-early adopters to all those involved in surgical hair restoration.

Read more findings of the 2015 survey.

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