What are the effects of stem cell transplants on hair? What are cryo caps and should they be used during transplant? Hair loss or alopecia is a common complication of chemotherapies that affect dividing cells. So the most common agent these days that we use in myeloma that causes hair loss is melphalan or the conditioning regimen that we use for stem cell transplant. So melphalan works when it's given a high dose and really there is nothing that can save your hair from that so easily. When we use a cryo cap or a cooling cap on the scalp, it basically reduces the blood flow to the hair follicles of this cap so that chemotherapy that's in the blood of the patient at that time does not get to the hair follicles and the hair may be preserved. Now this works quite well for patients with breast cancer or some of the other lower doses of chemotherapy. With high dose melphalan, I have never seen it work to great success, meaning to such a good success that the patient has a luxuriant hair growth immediately after high dose. Almost everybody loses their hair even if they use a cooling cap. That's what I have seen from my personal experience. There is also some talk that if we use the cooling cap on the scalp, that might lead to a relapse of myeloma starting from there. Again, that is not really supported by data one way or the other, but it's almost like going into the swimming pool, you might as well get water all over your body. You've decided to have a transplant, you're getting high dose melphalan into your body. I would probably, if I were in that situation, knowing everything I know, choose that. I would get melphalan all over my body, chasing every little myeloma cell that's sitting somewhere in the body. The main reason why I don't recommend cryocaps is that they don't really work that well. You will still lose hair, and the hair won't look really that good for about two months after stem cell transplant.
HealthTree • November 13, 2021
