Causes of Hair Loss
Hair loss or Alopecia is a common cause of concern for both men and women all across the world. Modern day over demanding and over stressed lifestyles has aggravated the problem severely, which was once considered to be a sign of getting older. Now men and women, even at the age of 30 suffer with hair loss. It has become so common that people are considering it as normal after the age of 35-40.
Hair growth follows a particular pattern and cycle. At any point of time ninety percent of scalp hairs are in growth stage and ten percent are in resting phase, after which they shed. Once a hair falls new hair starts growing in the same follicle and replaces the older one. On an average 50 to 100 hairs fall daily and are replaced with small, tiny, new budding growing hairs.
Some of the common causes of Hair Loss are:
- Heredity: Androgenetic alopecia which is characterized with hair loss at a certain age in all or most of the family members is considered to be genetically inherited. This kind of hair loss is more common in men than women.
- Severe Flu or very high Fever: Certain illness like flu and fever if become severe it can cause hairs to shift to resting phase and so hairs start falling. Regeneration and growth of new hairs is also stopped temporarily but soon after the illness, with in a period of three to four months normal hair growth cycle is resumed.
- Certain medical treatments like chemotherapy and radiation therapy also cause hair loss. Once treatment is over, normal growth of hair is resumed.
- Certain fungal or viral Infections that invade scalp can also cause sudden hair loss. Once the infection is treated properly hairs grow again soon.
- Poor Diet or Mal-Nourishment: When body is not getting required nutrients in the form of vitamins and minerals in sufficient amounts it directly contributes to hair loss. Vegetarians and physically over stressed people are at a higher risk for this kind of hair loss when they are not eating well balanced and nutrient-rich diet.
- Male pattern hair loss is caused in males due to hormonal and genetic reasons. This kind of hair loss can even occur in teen age. Guys taking steroids for body building also suffer with this type of hair loss.
- Applying harmful chemicals to hairs for styling treatments is also found to be one of the common causes of hair loss. Bleaching, coloring, perming, straightning of hairs causes hair loss if chemicals used are concentrated and harmful.