Minoxidil to treat hair loss and testing for your likelihood of success when using i

While it’s common knowledge that hair loss, medically referred to as alopecia, or hair thinning can be caused by genetics, did you know that how well you respond to certain hair loss treatments can also be affected by your genes?

Hair loss in Singapore is more common than we’d like to admit, but thankfully, treatment is easily accessible; We, The Clifford Clinic, for example, provide a wide range of treatment options ranging from hair transplant procedures to topical/oral medication like minoxidil or finasteride.

Minoxidil is an oral and topical medication most well-known for its use in treating hair loss, particularly, androgenetic alopecia (male or female pattern baldness). Minoxidil works by widening blood vessels to allow for more blood, oxygen, and nutrients to easily reach the hair follicles, promoting hair growth.

To get into the medical specifics, minoxidil is the inactive form of minoxidil sulfate, a potassium channel opener that plays a role in vasodilation (widening of the blood vessels) and trichogenic (hair growth) or hypertrichotic (hair growth promoting) pathways.

While highly effective for patients who are responsive to it, 30 to 40% of women and 50% of men are unfortunately not responsive to minoxidil. Additionally, results from using minoxidil can take up to 6 to 9 months to show, making minoxidil-based hair loss treatments a very pricey gamble to take in terms of time cost.

Fortunately, your likelihood of success with minoxidil can be tested for via a Minoxidil Response Test that uses SULT1A1 as a genetic marker for responsiveness to minoxidil. Sulfotransferase 1A1 is an enzyme coded for by the SULT1A1 gene; Sulfotransferase 1A1 is needed to convert minoxidil into active minoxidil sulfate, thus, having the SULT1A1 is a strong indicator that you will respond well to minoxidil treatment as you can produce the sulfotransferase 1A1 enzyme in your hair follicles that is needed to create the optimal scalp environment for minoxidil-based treatments.

The Clifford Clinic offers the TrichoTest to remove the uncertainty associated with using minoxidil; patients can confirm if minoxidil will be an effective treatment for them in as fast 7 to14 days post test as opposed to 6 to 9 months if they used minoxidil without doing a Minoxidil Response Test.

The TrichoTest does not stop at just testing your responsiveness to minoxidil, the TrichoTest analyses three polymorphisms within 16 single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNPs) in your DNA (48 genetic variations total) to generate a report based on your unique genetic profile to establish how likely you are to suffer from certain scalp or hair related conditions that cause balding or thinning of hair as well as determine how suitable certain hair loss medications or treatments are for you.

If you are interested in learning more about the TrichoTest or about the wide range of hair loss treatments we offer, why not stop by for a consultation with one of our doctors? Even if you happen to test negative for minoxidil responsiveness, our team is happy to help you explore all the other alternative options open to you.