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 Dr. Lee is the founder and owner of Regrowth LLC, a company based in Los Angeles and dedicated to the treatment of hair loss. He has been developing innovative products and treating hair loss sufferers for the past 16 years. Dr. Lee is the creator of the Xandrox line of hair loss treatments.
Important Note: Due a busy schedule, Dr. Lee cannot answer any new questions at this time; however, he will be providing high quality answers to questions he receives from his own practice exclusively to Morphollica.com regularly
[not named]
2004-03-05
Smoking and hair loss
Does smoking cause hair loss?
There really is no good evidence that there is any direct correlation between smoking and hair loss.
However, it has been found that smoking can increase the levels of androgens:
Department of Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health, Channing Laboratory, Boston, Massachusetts 02115.
The relationships of cigarette smoking, age, relative weight, and dietary intake to serum dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate (DHEAS), androstenedione, cortisol, 3-alpha-androstanediol, 3-alpha-androstanediol-glucuronide, testosterone, albumin-bound testosterone, free testosterone, dihydrotestosterone(DHT), and sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG) were examined cross-sectionally in 1241 randomly sampled middle- aged U.S. men. Compared with nonsmokers and independent of relative weight (body mass index) and age, cigarette smokers had increased serum levels of DHEA (18% higher, P = 0.0002), DHEAS (13% higher, P = 0.0007), cortisol (5% higher, P = 0.01), androstenedione (33% higher, P = 0.0001), testosterone (9% higher, P = 0.009), DHT (14% higher, P = 0.004), and SHBG (8% higher, P = 0.004). Androstenedione, total plasma testosterone, albumin-bound testosterone, DHT, and SHBG decreased with increasing relative weight. Age was positively associated with serum SHBG and negatively associated with albumin-bound testosterone, DHEA, and DHEAS. An association was found between alcohol intake and DHEA (r = 0.15; P = 0.0001), cortisol (r = 0.10; P = 0.0007), and 3-alpha-androstanediol-glucuronide (r = 0.08; P = 0.0004). Cortisol was the only hormone that was associated with carbohydrate intake (r = -0.09; P = 0.002). The only hormones associated with dietary (r = 0.07; P = 0.008) and crude (r =0.08; P = 0.007) fiber. These data suggest that serum adrenal steroid and sex hormone concentrations in middle-aged men are more influenced by cigarette smoking, age, and obesity than by dietary intake; however, serum adrenal steroids were influenced by alcohol intake.
Granted, there is no mention of MPB per se, but smoking can cause increased levels of DHT and smoking can make the hair brittle due to heat and smoke.
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