Trichoscopy: Usefulness in Diagnosing Hair Loss in Adult Female Patients

The document reports on a study that evaluated the effectiveness of trichoscopy, a noninvasive diagnostic technique for hair and scalp analysis, in differentiating types of hair loss in 75 female patients. The patients were diagnosed with alopecia areata (40 patients), androgenic alopecia (30 patients), and single cases of monilethrix, pseudomoniletrhrix, and Netherton syndrome. Trichoscopy revealed specific features for alopecia areata, such as micro-exclamation mark hairs, bulbs with no hair shaft, crochet hoot hairs, and hyperkeratotic hair follicles. For androgenic alopecia, characteristics included high hair shaft diameter diversity and low mean hair diameter. The study concluded that trichoscopy is a useful, fast, and noninvasive technique that allows for significant magnification of hair and scalp features without the need for hair removal, suggesting that further studies should establish clear criteria for diagnosing specific hair loss diseases using trichoscopy. No commercial support was identified for this study.