Hair Loss in Women

Although hair loss in men is often accepted stoically as a consequence of having an androgen-based body, women are not as accepting and want their physicians to be up-to-date on all the causes of and treatments for what can be a psychologically devastating condition. The author of a clinical practice review in the New England Journal of Medicine evaluates the causes of female hair loss, enumerates various treatment strategies, and presents clinical recommendations. He summarizes a prodigious amount of data on the subject and provides an excellent photo atlas documenting early and later stages of female-pattern hair loss. A table summarizes the most common forms of nonscarring hair loss: female-pattern, telogen effluvium, alopecia areata, ti…