Hair Restoration: Follicular Unit Transplantation
March 2013
in “
CRC Press eBooks
”
TLDR Follicular unit transplantation, a hair restoration technique using small hair grafts, was pioneered by Bob Limmer in the late 1980s and is still widely used today with minor improvements.
In the late 1980s, Bob Limmer pioneered follicular unit transplantation, a hair restoration technique involving the use of microscopes to create small one-to-five hair grafts. These grafts, stripped of excess non-hair-bearing tissue, were transplanted into 18-gauge needle sites. This technique is still largely used today, with minor improvements. In 1995, William Rassman documented the natural growth patterns of hair, noting that hairs grow most frequently in pairs, sometimes in groups of three, and more rarely in groups of four and five. This understanding of hair groupings was crucial in designing hair restoration procedures. In 1997, Robert Bernstein and Bill Rassman coined the term "follicular unit transplantation" to describe their technique.