Alopecia Areata Bald Patches Incorporated into Haircut

If you've seen any international football teams or music videos recently, you’d have been left in no doubt that elaborately-shaven head designs are definitely ‘in’. And that’s pretty fantastic news for some people with hair loss as one innovative and inspiring woman has proved.

Creative clipper work

Not all hair loss conditions would lend themselves to a grade-2 cut followed by some creative work with the clippers, but some cases of the autoimmune disorder Alopecia Areata, which leads to sudden, patchy hair loss, are definitely well-suited to it.

This has been ably demonstrated by a British girl named Bethan Crisp, who contacted the charity Alopecia UK to tell them about her adventures at the hairdresser…

“Bethan asked whether her bald patches could be incorporated into some sort of design,” wrote Alopecia UK on the organisation's Facebook page, “and this is what the barber came up with! Bethan's asked us to share in case her photos may inspire others.”

The beautiful photos show how Bethan’s hairless patches have skilfully been woven into a work of art which helps to both hide her hair loss and highlight it when people know the story behind the cut. In a brilliant snub to what many describe as a psychologically troubling condition, Bethan has taken ownership of things and turned her bald patches into something that is eye-catching for all the right reasons.

Comments from fellow Facebook users suggest that Bethan could be onto something and that this could be the start of a new trend.

Bethan had previously been featured on the Alopecia UK website when she sent in a picture of herself with a number of coin-sized bald patches on her head. “My hair started falling out when I was 11 and I’ve had Alopecia for almost four years,” she wrote in a posting in March 2014. “Things were very hard to start off with but over time I have realised that this is me and I am who I am and nothing is going to change me from being myself."

Multiple trials into Alopecia Areata

Click to View Belgravia's Alopecia Areata Treatment Success Stories

Alopecia UK do amazing work offering support and advice to people with all forms of Alopecia Areata, particularly the more severe forms of the condition which cause complete baldness: Alopecia Totalis and Alopecia Universalis.

All three types of autoimmune alopecia are currently the subject of multiple clinical trials around the world as the medical community searches for new treatments that are particularly effective on the more extreme forms of the condition.

Right now, although Alopecia Totalis and Universalis have no reliably effective treatment options, Alopecia Areata can usually be successfully treated at a specialist hair loss clinic. Belgravia has seen many Alopecia Areata treatment success stories from clients following personalised courses based around topical applications of high strength minoxidil which is often used alongside hair growth boosters.

Many people find that the proactive action of using treatment to accelerate regrowth is a comfort to them even though the hair may grow back of its own accord in a number of months. It is this ‘not knowing’ that makes autoimmune alopecia such a pernicious condition; even when bald patches do show signs of impressive regrowth there is no cast-iron guarantee that recovery will be permanent.

For this reason, Belgravia is watching global developments, such as trials involving several JAK inhibitor drugs, with keen interest, as this approach is markedly different to anything currently on offer. Few things concerning Alopecia Areata are straightforward, however, and there would appear to be a significant uphill battle that needs to be won before any new approach to treatment is deemed both safe and effective.