Suffering from seasonal hair fall?
With the summer over and winter just around the corner, hair often falls out like dead autumn leaves. So, is this normal and can anything be done about it?
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Such seasonal hair fall might only last 4 to 6 weeks, but it’s usually enough to lower moral and leave you worried about how best to care for your hair…
While for some, hair renews itself almost unnoticed, for others it can amount to 2 to 4 times more hair loss than during the rest of the year. So what do you do about this?
Hélène Clauderer, Director of the Clauderer Centre, gives her advice for testing to see if your hair is healthy and how to reduce the fall out of seasonal hair fall.
What triggers seasonal hair fall?
In spring and summer, sun rays increase the secretion of hormones which govern hair growth and provoke a reaction similar to that of plants: acceleration of growth during hot months and abundant shedding in the autumn, for hair that has reached the end of its life cycle.
This isn’t anything too serious, since, after a few weeks, everything will go back to normal with hair fall reducing gradually, until hair is back to it’s glossy self.
So, do you need to use hair treatments or just wait patiently for the storm to pass? Everything depends on the condition of your hair. If your hair’s thickness already has a tendency to thin, it is essential to use special hair care to repair it. It's worth starting this hair care even before seasonal hair fall has fully set in.
DIY seasonal hair fall test
This test is carried out just before you wash your hair, which has been left unwashed for at least 3 days:
- Fingers spread out, put your hand out flat, directly onto the skin of your scalp. Then, close your fingers firmly, one against the other, and slide them down over the hair from the root out to the tip;
- Put the strands of hair caught between your fingers onto a sheet of paper. Repeat this action around five times or until you’ve covered your entire scalp.
Now look at how much hair you’ve collected…
- Less than 10 strands: Everything is fine, your hair fall is normal;
- 10 to 15 strands: You are definitely beginning seasonal hair fall. As soon as you notice this, you can take a course of vitamin supplements (Iron, Vitamin C) for your hair;
- More than 15 strands: Seasonal hair fall is in full swing. As well as taking vitamin supplements, consider using a localised hair treatment. Try also to reduce your use of dryers, hot curlers and straightening irons, as well as chemical treatments such as highlights, perms etc.). The hair is already weak, so you don’t want to make the situation worse.
How does localised treatment help with seasonal hair fall?
Hair that falls out has already been dead for some weeks so localised hair treatments don’t act on the hair fall itself, but on re-growth. Such treatments help to ensure that fallen hairs are replaced with more abundant, strengthened strands of hair – encouraging healthy replacement.
Some hair, if it’s not whipped into shape on the outside, can grow back imperceptibly thinner, making your hair finer and difficult to style, year in year out.
In fact, it can happen that seasonal hair fall might not be so innocent, and an important diagnostic element is time. Seasonal hair fall should not last longer than four weeks (six weeks maximum). If it persists, there could be another underlying reason so you should look into what could be causing it. You should consult a dermatologist to get the right advice and treatment for your particular problem.
When in doubt…
It's not always easy for you to distinguish between occasional hair fall and an ongoing problem. If you have any doubts, you could need a deeper diagnosis to know for sure if it is a simple seasonal process or a more serious hair problem, which risks leading to a progressive weakening of hair strands during re-growth every year. Speak with your GP or dermatologist if you have any doubts.
Copyright © 2011 Doctissimo
Posted 12.10.2011
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