MONDAY, March 20 (HealthDay News) -- The use of finasteride in combination with oral contraceptives can improve female pattern hair loss just as it does for male pattern baldness, according to a report in the March issue of the Archives of Dermatology. Contraception is necessary because of the potential teratogenic effects of the drug.
Matilde Iorizzo, M.D., and colleagues from the University of Bologna in Italy, treated 37 premenopausal patients with female pattern hair loss with 2.5 mg of finasteride per day, measuring hair density at baseline and during a 12-month follow-up.
Photographs at one year showed improvement in 23 of 37 patients (62 percent). Thirty-two percent had slight improvement, 22 percent moderate and 8 percent great improvement. Hair density also increased and none of the patients reported adverse side effects. Thirteen patients had no response to the drug and in one patient, hair thinning worsened.
It is not clear if the higher dose of finasteride (2.5 mg versus 1 mg) or the anti-androgen effects of the oral contraceptive, which contained drospirenone, contributed to the success, according to the report. "Further studies are necessary to understand which patterns of female pattern hair loss respond better to this treatment," the authors write.
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