Calling all Peace Corps Volunteers; antimalarial drugs and hair loss

[CurlyOne]

Hi all! I haven't been around in a long time due to the fact I'm serving in the Peace Corps in Malawi.
I love my work and I love Africa but what I don't love is hair loss. If you are serving in a country with malaria you are required to take anti malarial drugs of some kind. The three biggies are mephaquine, doxicycline, and malarone. I am taking mephaquine and have been for a little over a year now. One of the side effects is hair loss. I love my hair but I thought since I never have reaction to other medications that this would be the same. Well little by little my hair has been leaving.
It's one of those things that takes you by surprise, you look up one day and your part is really wide and your pony tail has gotten really tiny.
I'm not super worried about lack of protein, I think my diet is better than a lot of PCVs, I get a lot of packages from my mom and she always sends tuna, salmon, protein powder etc and I take a multi vitamin already and I am going to get on a different anti malarial soon so my question is this;
Does anyone know any simple things to help regrow hair that has been lost to medication? It makes me sad I've lost so much but I'm not gonna panic, but I would like some advice.
Even some tips on better growth are appreciated. Keep in mind, I live in rural africa and I don't have access to much of what you do. I can have some stuff mailed from home but let's try the KISS (Keep It Simple Silly) method first.

Thanks!

[Anje]

For what it's worth, I spent a few months on doxycycline for acne and I don't think it affected my hair at all.

I've got a theory I've been working on that for people with hairloss that's related to the concentration of testosterone/DHT at the follicles. Some research is pointing to the fact that several fatty acids (especially studied has be linoleic acid) found in common vegetable oils will block the production of DHT.

Now I don't know offhand the mechanism by which mephaquine causes hairloss, but oiling your scalp with an unsaturated oil might be useful. Many people have reported getting their hair thicker by oiling with castor oil, for example, though that one is particularly thick and sticky when used alone. It might be worth a try. The Wikipedia article on Linoleic acid (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linoleic_acid) has a nice list of common (in the US) food and their relative concentrations of that fatty acid. I'm pretty sure oleic acid is similarly useful, but I need to go digging through the research articles a bit more to support that.

[CurlyOne]

Ok, oil is on the list, So how about nutritional supplements? I remember some hair growth supplements one was called Hair Volume and the other was Viviscal. Anyone know anything about these?

[Astraea]

MSM? Biotin? Bladderwrack? Saw Palmetto?

On LHCF there was a big to-do over Nioxin pills awhile back and I was under the impression that both viviscal and nioxin were noted for containing the above.

Have you had a complete blood panel? When I experienced hypervitaminosis A resulting in a lot of hair loss, what stopped it (and subsequently saved my liver and red blood cells) was removal of the culprit (retin A). So if you suspect one or more of the drugs in your malaria cocktail, simply removing it may give you the best results. Though I began taking large doses of biotin and MSM after my hair loss, I was doing so irregularly and believe my regrowth was just my normal growth and retention kicking back in. Sorry not to be of more help, if anything you have a very healthy attitude, please keep us posted!

[CurlyOne]

As far as the saw palmetto goes, what kind of doesage is it, a pill a day or 3 pills a day? I'm trying to find stuff that will be relativly inexpensive and easy to ship here.

Also, I remember a few years back scalp massage was big, can anyone speak for it in a regrowing capacity?

Sorry, I know I could find all the old threads somewhere rather than asking people to repeat what they've said/read a million times but I am restricted to my phone for internet and can only charge it twice a week.

[MandyBeth]

I'm on similar drugs for lupus and RA. Since it's medication induced, going off the drugs fixes the shed. But, malaria isn't worth it. The topicals won't do much, nothing does much other than going off the drugs. Other antimalarial drugs have different side effects, but they aren't any nicer.

[Astraea]

As far as the saw palmetto goes, what kind of doesage is it, a pill a day or 3 pills a day? I'm trying to find stuff that will be relativly inexpensive and easy to ship here.

Also, I remember a few years back scalp massage was big, can anyone speak for it in a regrowing capacity?

Sorry, I know I could find all the old threads somewhere rather than asking people to repeat what they've said/read a million times but I am restricted to my phone for internet and can only charge it twice a week.

From what I've read at LHCF, Saw Palmetto is an ingredient in Nioxin pills and other hair growth supplements that a few attribute to greater, thicker growth. They also use SP alone in tea rinses and in oil rinses and as pills but I've seen no links on dosage so unfortunately couldn't give you any data. Here are some LHC links:

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?p=2091769&highlight=palmetto#post2091769

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?p=2091659&highlight=palmetto#post2091659


I do know the ladies at LHCF are also keen on viviscal per your original post but don't have any first hand knowledge on that either however here are some links:

http://www.longhaircareforum.com/showthread.php?t=613531&highlight=viviscal
[/URL]
http://www.longhaircareforum.com/showthread.php?t=611127&highlight=viviscal (http://www.longhaircareforum.com/showthread.php?p=15834225&highlight=viviscal#post15834225)

LHC:

[URL]http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?p=2126547&highlight=viviscal#post2126547 (http://www.longhaircareforum.com/showthread.php?p=14233679&highlight=saw+palmetto+pills#post14233679)


HTH!

[quintanion]

I won't be much help for regrowth treatments, but is there any chance you can take a different antimalarial? Malarone has a reputation for causing fewer/less severe side effects than all the others, although it's very expensive. I don't believe doxycyline causes hair loss either. I experienced terrible sun sensitivity while taking it as an antimalarial, but not everyone gets this - might be worth a try to switch if you have the option.

[Kherome]

We had no trouble with the pills, I can't remember which we took, but if it helps they were fairly large and bright neon pink?

[MandyBeth]

I won't be much help for regrowth treatments, but is there any chance you can take a different antimalarial? Malarone has a reputation for causing fewer/less severe side effects than all the others, although it's very expensive. I don't believe doxycyline causes hair loss either. I experienced terrible sun sensitivity while taking it as an antimalarial, but not everyone gets this - might be worth a try to switch if you have the option.

Which is why those aren't used as much. Doxy is notorious for major sun sensitivity, which is worse than hair loss. Not all who take doxy get this, but at the antimalarial dose, it is almost all. Malarone is the one with the least effects, but it's not highly accessible.

[verylittlecarro]

Wow, your post gave me flashbacks. I was on antimalarials in Malawi many years ago and had significant hair loss. At the time I was on chloroquine and paludrine and I switched to malarone (I think, it was a long time ago). It did slow down eventually but I got really upset at the time. I saved the shed hair for a while and it was a LOT.

However, my hair recovered once I was off the antimalarials and is pretty darn thick these days, so no lasting damage.

Oh, and I got malaria. Twice. And bilharzia. Do make sure you get a proper tropical health check up when you get home!

Where in Malawi are you? What an amazing country.

[MandyBeth]

Other problem with Malarone - which should be capitalized as it's a brand name for a drug combo - is there is resistance to the drug developing. So it's not highly recommended as prevention. It still works, and if that's your only option, take it - but not if you have other options.

[CurlyOne]

Wow, your post gave me flashbacks. I was on antimalarials in Malawi many years ago and had significant hair loss. At the time I was on chloroquine and paludrine and I switched to malarone (I think, it was a long time ago). It did slow down eventually but I got really upset at the time. I saved the shed hair for a while and it was a LOT.

However, my hair recovered once I was off the antimalarials and is pretty darn thick these days, so no lasting damage.

Oh, and I got malaria. Twice. And bilharzia. Do make sure you get a proper tropical health check up when you get home!

Where in Malawi are you? What an amazing country.

Hey! Malawi! Cool! I'm near Nkhotakota near the game reserve! Where were you at?

As far as the drugs go, I am going to ask the peace corps medical office to switch me when I go in next month. I have been on mephaquine for over a year so I'm hoping I can deal with new side effects for a bit longer. Loosing your hair is so darn depressing!
I'm hoping that switching will stop the loss but I'm looking for ways to regrow. I must say I'm liking the Vivisical supplement. It sounds like it would be the added nutrition to boost things along. Hopefully I can convince the parents to spring for it.

Can I just say that wow I have missed this place!!! Its nice to have people who care about this stuff again!

[verylittlecarro]

I lost this thread for a while, sorry. I was near Zomba. But it seems a lifetime ago, it's 20 years now! I hope you're enjoying the experience (hair troubles aside, obviously!)