Reading before and after photographs.
We do not publish a gallery. We have no patient cases with documented consent to show, and borrowing a clinic's marketing images would tell you nothing we could stand behind. What follows is how to read theirs.
A pair of photographs is only useful with dates on it.
Growth follows a slow and counter-intuitive curve. The transplanted shafts shed within weeks, month three usually looks worse than the day of surgery, new growth appears from month four, and the result fills in through months eight to twelve. The crown can take eighteen.
So the date on an "after" photograph is the most important thing in it. A gallery that does not say how long after surgery each image was taken cannot be compared with anything, including itself.
Four things to check before you are impressed.
Same lighting.
Overhead light on a thin scalp shows every gap. Diffuse front light hides them. A "before" shot lit from above is doing work the surgery did not.
Same angle.
A "before" from above and an "after" from eye level are not a comparison. The crown looks worst from above and the hairline looks best from the front.
Dry hair, both times.
Wet hair reads as thin. Styled and dried hair reads as full. Very few galleries keep this constant, and it is the easiest tell.
The donor area shown.
Almost no gallery shows the back of the head afterwards. It is where over-harvesting is visible, which is why you should ask to see it.
Ask a clinic for three cases with a similar starting pattern to yours, photographed at twelve months, in the same conditions, including the donor area. How a clinic responds to that request tells you more than the photographs would.
Common questions.
How long until a transplant looks finished?
Twelve months for most of the result and up to eighteen for the crown. Anything photographed before nine months is showing you an early stage, not an outcome.
Why does the transplanted hair fall out first?
Shock loss is normal. The transplanted shafts shed in the first weeks while the follicles stay and regrow. It is the reason month three photographs look worse than month one.
Can I trust a clinic's own gallery?
Treat it as a sample the clinic chose. It shows what the clinic can do at its best, which is useful, rather than what it does on average, which is what you want.