Can Teens Experience Hair Loss?
Hair loss can affect anyone of all genders and at any age, which includes a person’s teenage years. Teens can experience hair loss due to various factors, including unmoderated stress, nutritional deficiencies, and autoimmune disorders. During their adolescent years, individuals who undergo hair loss may experience low self-esteem that might plague them throughout their adult lives. Teenage years embody youth, vibrancy, and looking at a person’s best, which makes hair loss a significant problem.
The good news is that hair loss is highly treatable, and the first step is to identify the underlying source of the problem.
Understanding the Causes of Teenage Hair Loss
It is crucial to address the underlying cause of hair loss with your hair specialist. Common causes include:
- Chemotherapy treatment: Potent medication used in chemotherapy, such as Cisplatin and docetaxel, may cause hair loss.
- Trichotillomania: an obsessive-compulsive disorder where sufferers have the urge to pull out their hairs. Unrelenting stress may cause Trichotillomania.
- Certain Hairstyles: hairdos like ponytails and buns apply constant pressure on delicate hair strands, leading to damage and hair fall.
- Autoimmune diseases: diseases like Alopecia Areata attack healthy cells in the body, which may cause hair to fall out.
- Genetic conditions: early onset male pattern baldness is a condition commonly linked to hair loss, as is hereditary female pattern thinning. While it usually affects middle-aged individuals, early-onset may occur during a person’s teenage years.
- Dietary deficiencies: low levels of minerals such as zinc, niacin, and iron may exacerbate hair loss symptoms.
Related: Emotional States of Hair Loss
Teenage Hair Loss: Seeking Treatment
Doctors may recommend the use of corticosteroid creams or injections on the scalp to stimulate hair growth. Minoxidil is a popular hair medication for patterned baldness, which widens blood vessels to deliver more oxygen to hair strands, leading to thick and healthy hair. Additionally, a dietician’s professional assistance can help guide sufferers through specialized meal plans that enhance hair growth.
In most cases, teenage hair loss is temporary, where individuals can regrow a headful of healthy hair by resolving the underlying cause. If your teenager is dealing with hair loss, a Transitions member hair loss center near you can help you understand the root causes of the hair loss you are experiencing and help you determine the best course of action to restore your teen’s hair and help them regain a normal healthy lifestyle free of the anxiety which so often comes with thinning hair and balding.