According to trichologist, Kate Dawes, IAT, an increasing
amount of young women, aged between 15 and 25, are seeking treatment for diet
related hair loss.
Ms Dawes says while genetic reasons, stress and other health
issues can play a factor in hair loss, trichologists increasingly see a lot of young
women who are affected by the condition due to completely preventable reasons.
She says while hair loss affects 50 per cent of women at
some stage of their lives, women are increasingly seeking treatment at a
younger age.
Ms Dawes says up to 40 per cent of the young women who seek
her help for hair loss have a nutritional source to their problem.
While the women she sees don’t necessarily all have an
eating disorder, many of them have an extremely limited calorie intake and are
starving themselves of the essential nutrients needed for their hair health.
The impact of this is seen in hair that is dull, breaks
easily and is either thinning or falls out.
Ms Dawes, the consulting trichologist for Medical Hair
Restoration Australia, says hair loss is often one of the first visible signs
of the damaging affects of excessive exercise and dieting.
She says after treating nutritional deficiencies, identified
through blood tests, patients often notice a big improvement in their hair health
within months.
Ms Dawes says a lot of women are quite surprised to learn that
nutrition plays such an important role in the health of their hair.
“There are many nutrients that play a role in the hair
growth cycle and hair and scalp health,” Ms Dawes says.
“However, the main nutrients that we find lacking are iron,
zinc, protein and vitamin D.
“While a lot of patients will act on my advice and improve
their diets, there are still some who continue to eat sparse and poorly
balanced diets and, as a consequence, the health of their hair does not
improve.”
Ms Dawes interest in nutrition and trichology began almost a decade ago, when
after being diagnosed with Graves Disease, now in remission, she sought a way
of managing her condition.
“I wanted to find a better way of healing and I became very
interested in nutrition and the link with a lot of diseases and hair and skin
conditions,” Ms Dawes says.
“I felt a strong need to work in a field that is healing,
and trichology – which treats hair loss, hair shaft breakage and scalp
conditions - enabled me to build on my experience as a hairdresser, was
the perfect fit.”
Medical Hair Restoration Australia is the distributor for the
Help Hair Protein Shake – a shake developed to support the complete nutritional
needs of hair and nails.
Developed by United States based hair transplant surgeon and
dermatologist Dr Larry Shapiro, Help Hair can be incorporated in a weight loss
program and is free of wheat, gluten, soy, eggs, nuts, peanut oil, artificial
sweeteners, MSG, artificial colours and flavours, growth hormones and sulphites.
