Your hair is constantly alternating between different cycles of growth, rest and loss throughout your lifetime. These cycles are know as the anagen, telogen and catagen phases of hair growth. Unfortunately, many people will experience a change in these phases causing an excessive loss of hair and even baldness. This excessive hair loss can occur for several reasons.
Cicatricial Alopecia
Cicatricial alopecia is one reason why you may be experiencing hair loss. Cicatricial alopecia, also known as scarring alopecia, occurs when physical damage or inflammation to the skin tissue results in scarring. This scarring can reach as deep as the hair follicle, causing hair to fall out and inhibiting the damaged follicle from being able to produce new hair strands.
Telogen Effluvium
Telogen effluvium can also cause excessive hair loss. Telogen effluvium occurs in response to physical or even emotional shocks to your body. Examples of events that can cause hair loss to occur include an accident, psychological stress, extreme fad diets that cause excessive unhealthy weight loss, nutritional deficiencies and even surgery. In telogen effluvium the shocking event causes a change in your body that forces your hair strands into their resting telogen phase. This can cause as much as 70 percent of your hair to fall out in as little as two months, states the American Osteopathic College of Dermatology.
Alopecia Areata
Alopecia areata may also be responsible for excessive hair loss. Classified as an auto-immune disease, alopecia areata affects an estimated 4.7 million people in the United States, according to the National Alopecia Areata Foundation. During this disease, your immune system turns on the hair follicles of your body, stopping their growth of new hair strands. The disease more commonly causes single bald spots, but may also cause complete baldness.
Medications and Medical Treatment
Certain medications and medical treatments may also affect hair loss. One of the most common examples of this are cancer treatments, such as chemotherapy, that attack the fast-growing cells of your hair follicles. High blood pressure medicines, such as the beta blockers metoprolol and atenolol, as well as the antidepressant paroxetine are among many medications that can potentially cause hair loss. Talk to your doctor or pharmacist for more detailed information of possible medicinal causes of your hair loss.
Androgenetic Alopecia
Androgenetic alopecia, more commonly referred to as male or female pattern-baldness, can also cause excessive hair loss. During this condition the overall growth phases of your hair are shortened, and the hair that does grow is thinner than healthy hair. This results in a receding hairline as well as pattern baldness. Androgenetic alopecia is believed to be largely genetic, but can also occur due to menopause, coronary diseases, diabetes, obesity and diseases of the prostate, states the U.S. National Library of Medicine's Genetics Home Reference.
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