A few months ago, I took Aiden to Dr. ENT and his wife happens to be a dermatologist. And I asked about her. She wasn't accepting new patients at the time and was only working part time. We touched on the issue of Aiden's alopecia.
Fast forward a few months.... Chris makes an appointment with a dermatologist in another office. And we went yesterday. While there, I asked if this dermatologist saw children, to which she said yes and we discussed Aiden's hair loss.
Fortunately, she does see a lot of children with Down syndrome who also have alopecia. And the pattern of hair loss that Aiden experiences is common. Unfortunately it is the second hardest to treat - next to alopecia totalis - but there is a treatment.
The treatment for alopecia areata (which the doctor says actually does work) is a series of steroid injections in the scalp. Granted, while she said it does work, the problem is that the back half of his head may not recover hair growth.
Do I really want to subject the child to injections? Not really, no. While I do feel for the child as he gets older and risks the eventual total loss of hair, I don't want him to have to go through this. This will have to be a decision he makes as he gets older.
Fast forward a few months.... Chris makes an appointment with a dermatologist in another office. And we went yesterday. While there, I asked if this dermatologist saw children, to which she said yes and we discussed Aiden's hair loss.
Fortunately, she does see a lot of children with Down syndrome who also have alopecia. And the pattern of hair loss that Aiden experiences is common. Unfortunately it is the second hardest to treat - next to alopecia totalis - but there is a treatment.
The treatment for alopecia areata (which the doctor says actually does work) is a series of steroid injections in the scalp. Granted, while she said it does work, the problem is that the back half of his head may not recover hair growth.
Do I really want to subject the child to injections? Not really, no. While I do feel for the child as he gets older and risks the eventual total loss of hair, I don't want him to have to go through this. This will have to be a decision he makes as he gets older.