Teenage Hair Loss: What Should You Do?

Any one young or old who is losing more than 100 head hairs a day, should seek help.  Hair loss can be the first outward sign of illness.  Healthcare provides can ascertain whether the cause of teenage hair loss lies in an illness, medication side effect, stress poor/inadequate nutrition, genetic predisposition or hormone imbalance.

Hair loss can occur from hereditary factors, health problems and using harsh chemical hair dyes.  Teenagers who suffer from stress such as peer pressure and relationship problems may lose their hair.

Hormonal changes are a common cause of hair loss in teens and adults.  From the onset of puberty throughout the teenage years, girls experience hormonal fluctuations.  During this time the body need extra support.  Good nutrition, vitamin supplementation, exercise, adequate sleep and ample relaxation will help ease a girl through these hormonal changes.  Many teens nowadays have bad eating and sleeping habits.  They often prefer to spend their time socializing on the computer, leaving little if any time for fresh air and exercise.  These bad habit wreak havoc on the hormonal system during this time and often cause undesirable effects such as hair loss. Some medication prescribed for teenager can result in loss of hair. 

These may include drugs to treat bipolar disorder, chemotherapy drugs, blood thinners, blood pressure medications, gout medications and high levels of vitamin A found in acne treatment.  To prevent hair loss, ask your doctor to describe the side effects before accepting a new prescription. Or if you are currently experiencing hair loss, consider switching medications to prevent future hair loss and encourage regrowth of lost hair.

Hair loss in young teenagers (often referred to as alopecia) is often thought to be caused by stress.  Your doctor might decide that is the cause of your hair loss. If so you should work on reducing your stress levels.  The best way to start is to talk to a parent or guardian about how you feel and whether anything is troubling you.  Then you can work on resolving problems together.  If you don’t feel you can talk to a parent or guardian, perhaps there is a teacher at school you could talk to?

At your age the hair loss might be due to stress, or some other underlying condition.  I highly recommend visiting your doctor to have your scalp and overall health examined.  Don’t be embarrassed to talk to your parent or guardians about your hair loss. It is very important that you address this problem now.  It could be something simple, such as a small dietary change that is required that may not only improve you hair but also your overall health.

The causes of children’s hair loss are numerous and varied including trauma resulting from an accident, symptoms of birth defects, scarring from surgery to remedy birth defects and alopecia areata (an autoimmune condition in which the body mistakenly form antibodies against its own hair follicies).  The condition commonly begins with the rapid onset of bald spots over the scalp. Although one smooth bald spot is most common, many may be seen, and every hair on the body may be lost in some patients.