PCOS Hair Loss


PCOS Hair loss is caused by excessive amounts of male sex hormones called androgens.

If you've been following me for anytime you know I always want to target the source of symptoms and not the symptoms themselves.

Androgens are produced in three areas within the female system;

1) The ovaries - driven by insulin resistance and high insulin levels
2) The adrenals - driven by excessive amounts of cortisol and stress
3) Adipose (fat) tissue - driven by excess body weight

How Androgens Cause Hair Loss

Your hair grows in a cycle with the actual hair growing about 0.3mm to 0.4mm each day, which adds up to around six inches per year. However, not all of the hair follicles are growing new hair at the same time. Hair growth occurs in a cycle. At any given time, each strand is in a different part of the cycle. It’s a good thing that each of our hair’s cycles are not in sync, otherwise we would shed all of our hair at once!

This means throughout the year your hair is in a constant cycle of growing and replacing hair. It’s why when you brush your hair some will fall out and get stuck on your brush but, because you are always growing more you don’t notice hair loss on your head.

Excess androgens negatively impact your hair growth cycle as it shortens the ‘anagen’ growing phase. It also lengthens the time between the shedding of a hair and the start of a new anagen phase.

This means it takes longer for hair to start growing back after it is shed in the course of the normal growth cycle. The hair follicle itself also changes, shrinking and producing a shorter, thinner hair shaft, a process called "follicular miniaturization." As a result, thicker, pigmented, longer-lived terminal hairs are replaced by shorter, thinner, non-pigmented vellus hairs.

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