If you are currently experiencing hair loss, your age may be a hint as to what might be going on to cause increased hair shedding.
And, while just your age will not give the full picture as to what the cause could be, it may be just some of many factors that your doctors consider when assessing your hair concerns.
Below, we have outlined the most common forms of hair loss and the ages (or parts of life) in which they tend to occur.
By far the most common cause of hair loss is androgenetic alopecia. Androgenetic alopecia is also known as male-pattern hair loss and female-pattern hair loss.
Other, less common causes of hair loss include hair loss from hormonal changes, telogen effluvium, nutritional deficiencies, or alopecia areata, just to name a few.
For many of these kinds of hair loss, there is a general age range, gender, or life situation that they may occur in more commonly.
Male pattern hair loss in men is driven by a genetic sensitivity to a hormonal testosterone by-product called DHT (Dihydrotestosterone). For this reason, depending on your genetic make-up and a few other factors, male pattern hair loss can technically start after puberty.
And, while it is possible to start seeing male pattern hair loss in the late teens or early twenties, for most men with male pattern hair loss it is a little bit later. The rate of androgenetic alopecia in men increases with increasing age. For instance, by age 50 more than half of white men experience visible male pattern hair loss, and by age 80, that number may be up to 80%.
While both male pattern hair loss and female pattern hair loss are considered androgenetic alopecia, the age range that they start showing up differs between the genders.
Female pattern hair loss tends to start showing up around midlife in the 40s, 50s, and 60s. This also tends to coincide with menopause, suggesting that along with the genetic predisposition to patterned hair loss, the hormonal changes during this time also play a role. However, there may be outliers where women start seeing female pattern hair loss before this age range.
Hormonal changes, whether natural or from outside sources can stimulate hair losses.
Some hormonal changes that could lead to hair loss can be tied to certain age ranges, like menopause which tends to occur between the ages of 45-55 in women.
Other situations which can stimulate hormonal-related hair loss include the time period after giving birth, or thyroid diseases. These types of hormonal hair loss are tied to the event of giving birth, or developing thyroid issues more so than being a certain age.
Telogen effluvium is a stressor-related type of hair loss in which up to 70% of the hair is shed approximately 2 months after a “shock” or extremely stressful event. These events may include giving birth, high fever, severe infections, major surgery or illness, rapid weight loss, certain medications, or severe psychological stress. Luckily, the hair tends to recover to its previous state over the course of many months as long as the trigger has been fixed or removed.
Since stressful situations can happen at any age, technically acute telogen effluvium can occur in all age ranges. But, chronic telogen effluvium tends to be more common in women aged 30-60 years of age.
Certain nutritional deficiencies may also lead to hair loss if they are not corrected. In general, older and elderly people are more likely to develop nutritional deficiencies due to the common decline in food intake with increasing age.
Aside from the risks of nutritional deficiencies from older age, some people may develop deficiencies due to GI disorders or strict diets, regardless of age.
If your hair loss seems to coincide with a change in your eating habits, talk to your doctor about testing to make sure you are not dealing with excess shedding from a nutritional deficiency.
Alopecia is an auto-immune-mediated type of hair loss in which hair tends to fall out quickly in clumps leaving round patches of hair loss. Compared to some of the other types of hair loss mentioned here, this one tends to occur in younger people.
Alopecia areata typically occurs in young adults, and incidence peaks between the ages of 20-25 years old. This condition can also occur in older people, although this younger age range is more common.
Here at Strut, we have developed multiple oral and topical formulations to help slow the progression and potentially aid in the recovery of the most common type of hair loss in adults -- androgenetic alopecia.
We utilize compounding pharmacies and active ingredients like Minoxidil, Finasteride, Dutasteride, Spironolactone, and Biotin in combination formulas to help amplify your end results.
If you would like to see if a prescription hair loss treatment is a good fit for your hair loss, simply select the product you are interested in and complete a free online questionnaire and image-based telemedicine consultation with our U.S. doctors in under 15 minutes. If you are a good fit for treatment, your doctor will put together a treatment plan based on your goals and preferences, and your prescription will be shipped to your front door with our free shipping.
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