Results on Dutasteride + Oral Minoxidil

[Eli_Avdikian]

As some of you might already know, I am a big proponent of medical therapy for MPB, myself following for some time now a regimen that includes oral dutasteride 0.5 mg daily, in conjunction with oral minoxidil 5mg daily. My story with hair loss medications has been very long and complicated, and I literally tried everything under the sun from topical minoxidil, to topical finasteride and dutasteride to no avail. My history with oral medication is the following : 

- I started oral minoxidil in March 2023, taking 1.25 mg daily for a month, and then switching to 2.5 mg daily.

- I upped my oral minoxidil dose to 5 mg per day in October 2023

- I started oral dutasteride in November 2023, working my up very gradually from one 0.5 mg capsule a week to 7 times a week ( passing through all intermediate doses such as 2 capsules a week, 3 capsules a week, etc)

I am posting some progression pictures since I find them to be rather impressive.

[Eli_Avdikian]

The crown on topical treatments (before) : 
 

[Eli_Avdikian]

The crown on oral medication (after) : 

 

[Eli_Avdikian]

mid-scalp before (my hairline is transplanted) : 

 

 

Edited August 11 by Eli_Avdikian

[Fox243]

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Edited August 6 by Fox243

[Eli_Avdikian]

mid-scalp after : 

 

 

 

Edited August 11 by Eli_Avdikian

[Fox243]

When would you say you got noticeable results on the crown?

[Eli_Avdikian]

3 minutes ago, Fox243 said:

When would you say that you saw noticeable results on the crown?

Results on oral minoxidil were quite slow. But within 3 months of taking oral dutasteride, i started seeing a very pronouned difference on the crown

[Eli_Avdikian]

 I forgot to mention. No side effects whatsoever 

[Ccd99]

These are some very impressive results! Surely you will continue to see effects as Dutasteride takes a very long time before it reaches max blood concentration levels at 0.5mg and once per day (I think somewhere in the region of 10-12 months).

Be prepared for more improvement

[Eli_Avdikian]

18 minutes ago, Ccd99 said:

These are some very impressive results! Surely you will continue to see effects as Dutasteride takes a very long time before it reaches max blood concentration levels at 0.5mg and once per day (I think somewhere in the region of 10-12 months).

Be prepared for more improvement

Thanks bro ! 

[Eli_Avdikian]

A new picture that I took just today 

[xabi86]

@Eli_Avdikian Thank you for your post. Very helpful.

Topical Finasteride or Dutasteride didn't work at all for you?

I am using topical fin from Farmacia Parati at the moment and I was speaking to a very well renowned european doctor's patient rep and he said any topical fin or dutasteride is a "waste of time and money". That has really got me worried now. 

Thinking of trying Dutasteride tablets now, given the whole reason why I switched to topical (0.01% fin) from Farmacia Parati was because I experienced sides from Finasteride. Did you get any sides from Dutasteride (tablets)?

[LeveledUp]

Man maybe it’s time for me to make leap to Dut.

i don’t think oral min 5mg and fin 1mg is doing anything for me regrowth wise 

[arthurSam]

Fake pics lol

[Eli_Avdikian]

On 8/9/2024 at 12:40 AM, xabi86 said:

@Eli_Avdikian Thank you for your post. Very helpful.

Topical Finasteride or Dutasteride didn't work at all for you?

I am using topical fin from Farmacia Parati at the moment and I was speaking to a very well renowned european doctor's patient rep and he said any topical fin or dutasteride is a "waste of time and money". That has really got me worried now. 

Thinking of trying Dutasteride tablets now, given the whole reason why I switched to topical (0.01% fin) from Farmacia Parati was because I experienced sides from Finasteride. Did you get any sides from Dutasteride (tablets)?

I think the patient rep is right. I wouldn't have peronsally put it this way, but topicals' efficacy is very limited, if any. Plus, they haven't been researched as well as oral 5AR, nor have they been prescribed to patients on a regular basis for a suffciently long time. All topicals suffer inherently from one main shortcoming, that is, difficulty penetrating the scalp. Most of them are insanely expensive, which explains the "waste of money " bit. Oral dutasteride or finasteride are extremely cheap in comparison. Topical 5AR should only be presribed to patients who absolutely refuse to be on oral medication, and never as a first line of defense against AGA. I haven't benifited personally from any of the topical drugs I've been on.

[Eli_Avdikian]

Of course ArthurSam is going to claim that my results are fake since I called out his BS on "exosome treatment"

[xabi86]

5 minutes ago, Eli_Avdikian said:

I think the patient rep is right. I wouldn't have peronsally put it this way, but topicals' efficacy is very limited, if any. Plus, they haven't been researched as well as oral 5AR, nor have they been prescribed to patients on a regular basis for a suffciently long time. All topicals suffer inherently from one main shortcoming, that is, difficulty penetrating the scalp. Most of them are insanely expensive, which explains the "waste of money " bit. Oral dutasteride or finasteride are extremely cheap in comparison. Topical 5AR should only be presribed to patients who absolutely refuse to be on oral medication, and never as a first line of defense against AGA. I haven't benifited personally from any of the topical drugs I've been on.

Thanks @Eli_Avdikian

you got no sides with dut right. Did you get them on fin tablets?

thinking of trying dut oral given I had sides on fin oral.

[Eli_Avdikian]

 

1 minute ago, xabi86 said:

Thanks @Eli_Avdikian

you got no sides with dut right. Did you get them on fin tablets?

thinking of trying dut oral given I had sides on fin oral.

I never tried oral fin. Jumped directly to oral dut. An luckily I haven't had any sides

[xabi86]

3 minutes ago, Eli_Avdikian said:

 

I never tried oral fin. Jumped directly to oral dut. An luckily I haven't had any sides

What do you reckon, worth trying dut if I got sides on fin? Are there any people who got sides on fin but didn’t on dut.

please any advice would be helpful 

[Fox243]

2 minutes ago, xabi86 said:

What do you reckon, worth trying dut if I got sides on fin? Are there any people who got sides on fin but didn’t on dut.

please any advice would be helpful 

might as well try but its extremely likely you will get sides on dut if you got sides on fin and could take a few months for the sides to wash out (given the long half life).

Edited August 11 by Fox243

[Eli_Avdikian]

@Fox243 What makes you so sure? Just because Dut is the stronger drug doesn't mean that it is more likely to cause sides, quite the contrary. The fact that it inhibits both type I and II of 5ARs and has a longer half life means there is potentially less room for hormonal inbalances and fluctuations. I could link the famous Sergio Vaño video that Melvin posted talking about low-dose oral Dut. Maybe, just maybe, @xabi86 could benefit from trying it

[Fox243]

1 minute ago, Eli_Avdikian said:

@Fox243 What makes you so sure? Just because Dut is the stronger drug doesn't mean that it is more likely to cause sides, quite the contrary. The fact that it inhibits both type I and II of 5ARs and has a longer half life means there is potentially less room for hormonal inbalances and fluctuations. I could link the famous Sergio Vaño video that Melvin posted talking about low-dose oral Dut. Maybe, just maybe, @xabi86 could benefit from trying it

I mean blocking 5aR type 1 isn't a good thing lol. It's abundantly expressed in the brain and there's not natural occurences/long term research of it, unlike fin. And with fin, there's not really hormonal imbalances/fluctations because even though the drug half life in the blood is like half a day, it is 4-5 days in the tissue, which is what matters. But I don't want to go down this rabbit hole again.

[Eli_Avdikian]

Not sure this is relevant because the brain is protected by the blood-brain barrier. It would be hard for a large molecule such as Dut to cross it. Plus inhibiting 5AR in the brain isn't necessarily a bad thing. It's isn't even established that inhibiting pregnenlone is deterimental to mental health, not to mention the conflicting reports that say that it might even be beneficial 

[Eli_Avdikian]

Anyway, all of this is just pure theoretical speculation. All studies prove that dut has the same, if not better, safety profile than fin. Many clinical practionners and patients' anectdotes support this as well (if you care to search on the web)