The Baldometer

Like many men of my age, with rapidly thinning locks, my thoughts occasionally wander to the subject of baldness treatments. Is there really a miracle cure for hair loss? Can it really be reversed, as Shane Warne and various ex-cricketers claim on those TV adverts which show late at night on ITV4, (usually during the penultimate commercial break of the early hours repeat of The Professionals)? If I was a cynic, I'd speculate that the reason these adverts for hair loss treatment clinics are shown so late at night is that the makers hope viewers will be too tired to notice that, more often than not, the miraculous hair recoveries sported by their subjects look suspiciously like elaborate comb-overs. However, I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and check out some of these 'treatments' online.

Basically, there seem to be three main categories of hair loss treatments: lotions you rub into your scalp; laser treatments and hair transplants. Do any of them work? I must admit the lotions intrigued me - could it be that simple to restore your thinning hair? Well, the answer is - no. In reality thee are some things which, when applied to the scalp, can stimulate hair growth. The catch is that it isn't permanent - you have to keep applying the expensive lotions or lose it again. A cheaper version of this are caffeine-based shampoos. But surely if they actually worked, then it would be cheaper to rub coffee grounds onto your scalp? And since when has coffee been a proven hair restorative, anyway? Likewise for laser treatments - if they stimulated hair growth, balding men would be sticking their heads in supermarket barcode readers up and down the country. Utter bollocks.

Anyway, whilst browsing one of these sites, I came across the extraordinary baldness index calculator, or, as I like to call it, the 'baldometer'. Basically, this consisted of a series of questions relating to the state of your hair and your lifestyle, from which the 'device' calculates your hair loss index. Disconcertingly, between the questions, a video of some old bloke (with a full head of silver hair) lectures you in German. Allegedly he is some kind of hair scientist. Unfortunately, people like me, who grew up on a diet of war movies and comics, white-coated German accented scientists are forever associated with unspeakable human experiments in concentration camps and developing deadly viruses to be carried in the warheads of V-2 rockets. Despite this distraction, I answered all the questions, (more or less truthfully), and was rewarded with the information that I had a baldness index of 75 years. What the Hell does that mean? That I have the hair of a 75 year old man? Because I've met 75 year old blokes with full heads of hair. Or does it mean that I'll be totally bald by the time I reach 75? Who knows. It really shouldn't come as a surprise that, like everything else connected with the hair loss treatment business, the 'baldometer' is a load of utterly meaningless bollocks.

Sadly, the only thing which might restore your hair is an expensive, painful and time-consuming surgical procedure to transplant follicles from your arse to your head. Only wealthy, vain and idiotic people like Wayne Rooney and Elton John indulge in such treatments. So, for the rest of us, I'm afraid the only option is to try and master the comb-over, (and it is surprising how quickly you can become proficient at this once the hair starts thinning). Either that, or invest in a decent wig. Of course, we could all just grow bald gracefully. Which might not be so bad - contrary to what the TV adverts tell you, baldness doesn't rob you of your manhood and render you socially unacceptable. On the contrary, just look at all those bald and proud icons of masculinity, like Sean Connery, Yul Brynner, Telly Savalas and Harry Hill. Indeed, only this evening I saw Peter Davison, (an actor I've always liked - a very nice guy and a Labour voter), on a TV programme and noted that his hair was following the same pattern of thinning as mine and he didn't look to bad, (he even pulled in the course of the programme). So if it is good enough for the fifth Doctor, it's good enough for me!