KEEP YOUR HAIR ON

MORE THAN HALF OF MEN AND MILLIONS OF WOMEN ARE AFFECTED BY HAIR LOSS. IT CAUSES LOW SELF-ESTEEM IN SOME AND ANXIETY IN OTHERS. THANKFULLY, SCIENTISTS AROUND THE WORLD ARE GETTING TO THE ROOTS OF THE PROBLEM WITH PIONEERING NEW TREATMENTS

- HAYLEY BENNETT

As the partner of a 40-something male, I'm acutely aware of the hair-loss horizon looming large in our house. With the first signs of a receding hairline come furtive glances in the bathroom mirror, then throwaway remarks about shaving it all off. Pretty soon, we'll be stocking up on scalp cream and hats.

Going bald is no joke, though, as the now-retired American body-image expert, Prof Thomas Cash, showed in a 2001 study. Cash convinced 145 customers of Virginian barber shops and hair salons to visit his lab, where he checked the extent of each man's hair loss and asked them how they felt about it. Men who had more severe balding were less satisfied with their hair, but also with their overall appearance, admitting to feeling self-conscious and unattractive, while actively coping by restyling their hair, trying to dress better and embracing the aforementioned hats.

And while Cash's study focused on men's hair hang-ups, plenty of women have to confront hair loss too. In fact, according to Dr Christina Weng, a dermatologist in Boston, Massachusetts, and chief medical officer at Los Angeles based company Pelage, which is developing a new drug to treat the condition, the majority of patients she sees for hair loss are women. "Hair is obviously a big part of identity so it's really distressing and the treatments are very limited for female patients," she says. In contrast to men, who lose their hair in the classic pattern we've come to expect (the receding hairline and bald spot) women are more likely to have thinning across the whole scalp.