Brit, 26, left with horrific scars after botched £1,250 hair transplant in Turkey
A BRITISH man was left with bald spots and scarring after undergoing hair transplant surgery in Turkey.
Luke Horsfield had always felt self conscious about his thinning hair line and decided to take action and booked surgery at the clinic in Istanbul.
The 26-year-old found the clinic online advertising the procedure for £1,250, around half the price of what it would cost in the UK.
Around 6.5 million men in the UK suffer from hair loss.
Luke said he began to notice his hair thinning when he was 21 and decided years later to go under the knife.
He underwent a six hour operation at the Clinic Center in Istanbul in December 2018.
Do your research
He was then contacted by the Hair Dr clinic in West Yorkshire who offered to fix the botched surgery.
"Patients can get drawn in by free consultations and sales pitches with offers of free flights, accommodation and knockdown rates for hair transplants.
"The reality though is that too often we are seeing men return with hair transplant surgery that has gone wrong or had complications.
"Anyone can put up a nice-looking website to sell transplants, but it takes skill and training to do hair transplants properly."
He added that transplants change your scalp permanently and that they can leave scars and alter your appearance.
"It is much better to get no transplant at all rather than getting the wrong transplant at the wrong time."
He said if you're looking for a transplant then are some things you need to do first.
"Men thinking of getting a transplant should ask themselves if a transplant is the right option for them, will they look back in 5 or 10 years and say ‘ why didn’t someone stop me?' - if they do decide to get a transplant, they need to ask are the surgeons qualified, is the after care good enough, does the clinic have a good reputation - these transplants are permanent, remember.
"Most people don’t need a transplant if they catch their hair loss early enough and could manage their hair loss with medication such as Finasteride and Minoxidil which are proven to be affordable, safe and effective (in over 90% of men)."
"Before embarking on a hair transplant it is imperative that research is carried out on the clinic and the surgeon.
"Hair transplant is very safe surgery but is not free of potentially serious side effects if it is not conducted by a qualified surgeon in the correct way.”
He urged people to check the surgeon has a credible track record in the field and to check that they are a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of
England before embarking on such a sensitive procedure.
Complications
"That way we can try and limit the number of unfortunate stories like Luke's”, he added.
The Clinic Center told The Sun that it treats 2,000 patients a year - most of which are from the UK.
They said: "We followed Luke's healing process after a month, three months and six months. He was not happy with his results and we told him to wait until 12 months to see the final result."
They said this is because in hair transplants you can "see the final results in 12 months".
"Some patients have a great look after 6 months but some of them have poor results in the 6th month but a great result after 12th.
"Unfortunately, Luke had a complication after his hair transplant which we rarely experience".
They added that Luke "refused their help".
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"Patient satisfaction is our primary concern and we always improve our services accordingly.
"We are sad that he was not happy with his treatment but we wish that he could have let us assist him", a spokesperson added.