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Over the past few years that Dr. Steve Gabel has been recommended on the Hair Transplant Network, I have gotten to know him and his ultra refined work. I have come to regard him as being highly ethical and a likable straight shooter who works hard to provide his patients with excellent hair transplant results at modest cost.

So I was not surprised to find while visiting his hair restoration clinic that he and his staffs’ truly ultra refined hair transplant procedure was outstanding from start to finish.

I also had the opportunity to see a few of his hair transplant patients in person and their results were very natural. These patients were very pleased with their results and their entire experience. To view their before and after photos visit our hair restoration forum.

I was very impressed with the great attention to detail and care that Dr. Gabel and his staff showed at every step of the procedure.

Dr. Gabel took ample time to carefully remove the donor strip in sections in order to avoid follicle transection (severing follicles) and any damage to the underlying tissue, blood vessels and nerves. He adopted this careful donor strip removal from the expert surgeon Dr. Ray Konior of Chicago.

Dr. Gabel then performed a trichophytic closure that included using subcutaneous sutures (internal sutures in the tissue under the skin). These internal sutures pull the underlying tissues beneath the skin together so that the second external running suture simply closes the skin with minimal tension. Since tension is a leading factor in scarring, the low tension on the scalp’s skin consistently produces pencil thin donor scars.

“Who is the best hair transplant doctor” is a common question posed on our hair restoration discussion forum and typically leads to subjective answers. As members post their preferences for particular hair transplant doctors, please understand that though some  data may be objective – there is a lot of subjectivity.   However, the real question is not “who is best” but rather “how do we know which hair restoration physicians truly perform state of the art hair transplantation”?

At the Hair Transplant Network, we recommend only those hair restoration physicians who truly have a proven track record in performing state of the art hair transplantation. Members of the Coalition of Independent Hair Restoration Physicians consist of an elite group who perform regular larger sessions of ultra refined follicular unit hair transplantation. To see our coalition membership standards click here.

All of our hair restoration doctors are continually reviewed and assessed in a few ways.

Pat Hennessey, the Publisher of our community, has visited and continues to visit our hair transplant physicians as well as other potentially promising leading hair restoration clinics worldwide. To date, the Hair Transplant Network is the only Network worldwide to assess their hair transplant physicians in this way. To see the highlights from Pat’s visits, view “Visits to Leading Hair Transplant Clinics“.

Pat’s visits include but are not limited to:

• Assessment of the hair transplant surgical procedure (including session sizes), technique, and tools used to perform the surgery. This assessment is measured against other leading hair restoration clinics worldwide who have a consistent track record of producing first-rate hair transplant results.

I recently had the opportunity to visit Dr. Williams and his staff as they performed a truly ultra refined hair transplant procedure in their Henderson office in the Las Vegas area. I found the high quality and refinement of their work very reassuring. After speaking extensively with the clinical staff it was obvious that they had extensive experience and took great pride in the quality of their work and patient results.

All grafts are trimmed under microscopes. Graft quality that I observed was excellent. The staff does not sub divide the naturally occurring 1, 2, 3 and 4 hair follicular units when creating grafts. Dr. William and his staff focus on one patient a day and have the capability to do 3,000 graft sessions.

Dr. Williams has a strong surgical background and has been performing follicular unit hair transplantation exclusively for the past seven years. He has a very good bedside manner and is very candid with his patients.

Patients are also provided with free post op low light laser therapy (LLLT). Dr. Williams and his staff have no doubt that this post op treatment has accelerated both the healing and growth for their patients.

Like many other leading hair transplant physicians, Dr. Williams often uses both perpendicular (lateral) and parallel (sagital) graft incisions depending on the area he is transplanting and whether the area has pre-existing hair. He never requires his patients to shave their hair.

Having seen many impressive hair transplant results from Dr. Rahal‘s patients on our hair restoration discussion  forum  over the past year, I expected to see the very best while at his hair restoration clinic. I’m pleased to write that after seeing he and his meticulous and dedicated staff performing truly ultra refined follicular unit grafting  I can now understand how they consistently produce such impressive and ultra refined results.

Dr. Rahal has worked for over ten years to evolve and refine his technique and build up his large and experienced staff so that they can provide hair transplant patients with large and highly refined sessions exceeding 3000 follicular unit grafts. At least two of his lead medical technicians have been with him for over ten years.

On the day of my visit I had the pleasure of speaking with three of his patients in person and his staff. They all spoke in glowing terms about Dr. Rahal’s passion for his work and his patients.

I had heard the stories about him driving his patients around town and to the airport to make not just their surgery but their visit optimal.

One patient who posts as “RahalPatient” on our  hair restoration discussion forum  came by so I could see his very impressive 9 month results, which are also shown in this photo album. In only one session “one pass” he truly achieved both naturalness and density.

Dr. Cam Simmons practiced hair transplantation as an associate of the Seager Hair Transplant Centre from 1999 to 2005 and founded the Canadian Hair Transplant Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada in 2006. Dr. Simmons was fortunate to have some of the senior medical technicians from the Seager Hair Transplant Centre join him.

Dr. Simmons and his staff’s technique and procedure remain very similar to the “stick and place” procedure performed at the Seager Hair Transplant Centre under Dr. Seager‘s tenure.

The “stick and place” technique describes the process in which the technicians make a recipient site incision and then immediately place the hair graft into the incision. By placing follicular unit grafts immediately into a fresh incision that have not had time to contract or coagulate incisions can potentially be smaller relative to the size of the typical graft.

The stick and place procedure performed by Dr. Simmons is actually performed by experienced hair transplant technicians who follow the design created by him. However, Dr. Simmons often does the stick in the critical hairline areas.

Dr. Simmons uses 19 and 20 gauge needles (which create incisions of approximately 1.1 mm and 0.9 mm) to create the incisions for the follicular unit grafts. His staff trims the follicular units so they include the surrounding tissue. Dr. Simmons believes that these “chubby grafts” have a higher rate of survival and growth than grafts that are trimmed into skinny or tiny grafts.

In late 2006 Dr. Mark McKenzie took over the management of the Seager Hair Transplant Centre as its medical director and operating surgeon. He inherited a clinic with a world renown reputation for innovation and quality that was cultivated by Dr. David Seager.

In December of 2006 Dr. David Seager passed away after battling cancer (to read a fuller account visit this page). But his legacy and his clinic have continued on with Dr. McKenzie now at the helm.

Prior to joining the Seager Hair Transplant Centre, Dr. McKenzie performed hair transplantation independently since 1994. He recently underwent a hair transplant procedure that was performed on him by the Seager staff.

Dr. McKenzie and his staff’s technique and procedure remain very similar to the “stick and place” procedure performed at the Seager Hair Transplant Centre under Dr. Seager’s tenure.

The “stick and place” technique describes the process in which the technicians make a recipient site incision and then immediately place the follicular unit graft into the incision. By placing grafts immediately into a fresh incision that have not had time to contract or coagulate incisions can potentially be smaller relative to the size of the typical graft.

The stick and place procedure is actually performed by the experienced technicians at the clinic who follow the design created by Dr. McKenzie. However, he often does the stick in the critical hairline areas.

Ontario is home to some big names in hair restoration. While some of these physicians are well known online and off line, I decided to focus my visits on those clinics that I felt were both ethical and performing truly state of the art hair transplantation.

Those clinics and physicians that I believe currently merit inclusion as “Leading Hair Transplant Clinics in Ontario ” are -

Dr. H. Rahal of Rahal Hair Transplant in Ottawa
Dr. Cam Simmons of the Canadian Hair Transplant Centre in Toronto
Dr. Mark McKenzie of the Seager Hair Transplant Centre in Toronto

Those clinics that I visited that I believe did not merit inclusion as leading Ontario clinics are not included in this report.

I would have liked to observe the surgeries of Dr. Marla Rosenberg in Toronto and Dr. Christopher Cole in Emeryville for potential inclusion. However, due to scheduling conflicts I was not able to observe their surgeries during my time in Ontario.

Toronto and its large place in Hair Transplant History

Toronto is home to two big names in the hair loss industry and evolution of hair transplantation – Dr. Walter Unger and Dr. David Seager. While Dr. Walter Unger has long represented and championed the old traditional techniques of large grafts, Dr. David Seager was one of the early innovators and promoters of all microscopically prepared follicular unit mega sessions.

The influence of these two prominent hair transplant surgeons continues to impact hair restoration, not only in Toronto, but around the world.

Dr. Beehner has been recommended on the Hair Transplant Network for over six years and has consistently earned strong patient reviews in the past from his very loyal patients (view his profile/recommendation) .

He is also very well respected by his physician colleagues and was awarded the highest honor in the field of hair transplantation – the Platinum Follicle award.

Dr. Beehner himself suffered from hair loss and did hair transplantation in the early eighties. He then became interested in improving the results he and other patients could get and has performed hair transplantation exclusively for the past ten years.

In my opinion, he is very genuine and interested in providing his patients with the best combination of naturalness, fullness and value. While he does provide sessions of all microscopically trimmed follicular unit grafts, Dr. Beehner believes that some patients can achieve the optimal illusion of density by using some multiple follicular unit grafts in the central areas.

These multiple follicular unit grafts, which are all trimmed under microscopes, typically contain two or even three follicular units that are naturally close together. Thus such multi haired grafts are able to achieve a higher density of hair than can be achieved by placing separate follicular unit grafts into even the most densely packed incisions.

Thus by judiciously and strategically placing a limited number of multiple follicular unit grafts in the central areas behind the hairline, Dr. Beehner believes that these denser grafts can break up and mask what might otherwise be a see through or transparent looking hair transplant.

After watching Dr. Bessam Farjo and his wife Dr. Nilofer Farjo and their staff in action over two days and two impressive ultra refined surgeries during May of 2007, I was very pleased to see that they have successfully incorporated all of the most important recent advances in hair restoration into their clinic and procedure.

All of their grafts are carefully trimmed under microscopes, with Dr. Nilofer Farjo closely supervising the medical technicians, while cutting and placing grafts herself. Nilofer is very hands on and does the critical slivering (sectioning of the donor strip into thin “slivers” that are then divided by the technicians into individual follicular unit grafts). She also does most of the primary training and supervising of the medical technicians using the video screen.

Both Bessam and Nilofer also create all the carefully oriented and minimally invasive graft incisions using custom cut blades that are as small as 0.7mm. Their use of small incisions enables their patients to achieve greater density in a single session, while experiencing quicker healing.

They take a team approach to the surgery with all hands on deck and working harmoniously together. Given the size and skill of the team the clinic can perform large sessions in excess of 3,000 grafts when appropriate for the patient. They typically limit themselves to one patient a day to achieve an optimal level of care.

In my opinion Dr. DeVroye has worked very hard over the past ten years to create a world class hair transplant clinic that provides truly ultra refined follicular unit grafting. He has paid his dues also by visiting leading clinics around the world and attending the major international hair meetings.

I had the honor of watching Dr. DeVroye perform two ultra refined follicular unit procedures over two days, and viewing patients on a third day. I was very impressed at all stages of the procedure. It simply doesn’t get any better any where. The photo highlights from this May 2007 visit are shown below – Note the photos are of both a session with a man and the female patient from the following day.

His website at http://www.hairtransplantsurgery.com also provides a wealth of great information in multiple languages, including immediate post op photos and examples of his trichophytic closure.

Having seen him perform surgery and discussed the finer details of his surgery I believe that Dr. DeVroye is both an artist and a skilled hair transplant surgeon. He strives for perfection and it shows in his staff, the procedure and in the final patient results.

His procedure is one of the most minimally invasive, refined and clean procedures that I have every seen. His staff also seems to share his enthusiasm and commitment to excellence. They work together as a team harmoniously and their all microscopic graft cutting and placing are second to none in my opinion.