I have looked at a lot of companies for inspiration and provocation for me to excel, and there is no better slogan out there that fits me than Maserati’s “Excellence Through Passion.”  Is it catchy?  Not really.  Is it funny and amusing?  No.  In short, it summarizes what I stand for and what my practice stands for.  

I had a patient about a month ago ask me, “Dr. Lam, what makes your hair transplant different than down the street?”  I responded that it would take me 10 minutes to answer that question and that is why my website was so detailed in showing why we were better at every little nuance at the job.  After I answered the question (which did take me 10 minutes, ask Emina), I summarized the entire thing by saying, “If I can boil it down to one word, it is passion.”  Honestly, if you look into your surgeon’s eyes and what you see back is a glazed over dead look, are you going to feel comfortable with him/her during the procedure?  How about after the procedure?  Do you think if there is any little problem that he/she would even care to make sure that it is right?  Well, you decide that one.  

When passion underscores everything, then you have the chance for excellence because there are no other options but excellence for someone who is passionate.  Is the surgeon’s passion the only thing that matters with hair restoration?  Absolutely not.  The entire team must be imbued with that same level of passion.  

If you have been reading my site carefully, you will see that I have often referred to hair restoration as very similar to building a car.  That means every person at the plant must be equally vested in your practice.  That is why I don’t outsource my staff and I have vested them into your results.  You will feel absolute dedication from EVERY TEAM MEMBER.  Every team member is a vital part of the results.  They come in to inspect their results after the procedure so that they have proper feedback as to what he or she has done.  As mentioned elsewhere on this site, they are also in the room at all times, i.e., to say the graft cutters sit literally next to me in the cockpit to make sure that there are no problems and that we are all working toward the same end, i.e., your excellent grafting results.  

The other thing that I like about Maserati as a company is how they achieve “Excellence Through Passion.”  The number of cars that Mercedes builds in one hour (btw, I love Mercedes so don’t get the wrong idea here), is the number that Maserati builds in one entire year.  Each car is custom ordered a year before and hand built by the same team to do the job.  That level of customization and anal detail where the job order is limited and the time to do the job right is appropriately allocated is how we “build our car”.  We take care of each person one at a time.  We never do 2 transplants a day.  We never burn out and do 10 a week.  We never have to outsource to bring people in so that we can make more money.  We never sell you and harass you after an initial consultation.  We never actually even sell you.  We educate you.  This is a trusting relationship not an abusive one.  Okay, enough said.  Hopefully, this analogy makes sense to you.

I have just updated the “Ask Dr. Lam” hair transplant forum section in order to facilitate and improve the Q/A process.  Also, so it won’t look like the old Roman Forum pictured.  The new forum should be much easier to navigate, much more secure, and also much easier to read.   Please enjoy; and comments are welcome and appreciated.

In 2005, the Prostate Cancer Prevention Trial (PCPT) showed that a dosage of 5 mg of finasteride (Proscar) could reduce prostate cancer risk by 25% as compared with placebo.  However, the follow-up study seemed to indicate that there was a higher risk of developing a high-grade (bad) type of prostate cancer when taking finasteride at that dosage. 

A 2008 update revealed actually that there was a 30% reduction in the risk of prostate cancer when on finasteride; and when 500 samples of prostates were evaluated by a pathologist, there was no increased risk of prostate cancer in individuals on finasteride.  It was deemed to be an artifact (i.e., artificial result) of the prostate shrinkage that occurs on finasteride.  For more information on finasteride, please visit our page which details everything you should know if you are on finasteride (Propecia) for male pattern baldness/hair loss.

I have greatly expanded and streamlined the process to contact us at the Lam Institute for Hair Restoration by adding a right hand column on every page other than the home page with options to email us, send the page to a friend, click to call, call, locate us via map and Google directions, advanced search, and calendar.  I hope that is a useful addition to this website.

If you noticed something different with this website, it’s that the whole shebang has gone widescreen.  It should be easier for you to read the text and feel a bit roomier, so enjoy.  I welcome any feedback.  

On Thursday, I read an article in the New York Times about plastic surgeons offering patients discounts or free services to provide testimonials on the surgeon’s behalf.  I want to state that no patient on this website was offered any kind of discount or free service to speak on our behalf.  Clearly, a paid testimonial undermines the credibility of the testimonial.  I know however that several patients were offered severely marked down costs for procedures to be done by my colleagues here in Dallas in exchange for testimonials.  However, they still chose us to do their procedure.  I did some serious thinking of whether I have accepted discounts for testimonials and I can say that in almost every case I did not except 2 local news spots on Restylane injections: see my blog on lamfacialplastics.com for more details.  Just want you guys to know my position on all of this so that you can believe what you see on this site, as every testimonial on this site was unpaid, undiscounted, and uncompensated.

During a consultation in the past, I have mentioned a few times the way that I see quality hair restoration as analogous to building a car.  The quality of the car is directly proportional to every step in the process.  There can be not one small component that does not work otherwise the result is less than stellar.  That is the reason that I keep my production numbers down to 2 to 3 cases a week but I perform those cases almost every single week to maintain proficiency and so that I don’t need ever to outsource staff coming in.  All staff members are with me full time all the time and don’t burn out.  I shall be talking about corporate culture in Vegas in 2 weeks and I believe that if every staff member is empowered with the sense of mission, values, and passion, they will perform like the leader.  

I like to cite Principle 5 of 14 from the book, The Toyota Way, which is how we run our hair transplant procedures.  Here it is: “Build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality right the first time. Any employee in the Toyota Production System has the authority to stop the process to signal a quality issue.” That means during the production of a car, if the guy sweeping the floor sees a problem, he stops production of the entire car manufacturing process so that there is immediate stop of continuing problems that can have larger and larger ramifications on quality.

Every worker during a hair transplant knows that if there is the slightest problem during the work, that problem is reported upward and everything stops until we can see what the issue is. As example, I perform 4 to 5 recipient sites, then Emina comes in and checks that the grafts that she is making fits my sites. If not, what she is doing stops, the girls stop, and everything stops until we are certain that the grafts fit the sites. That is why no one works in a separate vacuum environment. All graft cutters sit next to me. That level of quality goes back and forth as a dynamic environment from beginning to the end of the case. That is a commitment level of continuous quality improvement (CQI) that is rarely exercised in today’s “factory mentality” when it comes to hair restoration even in the top transplant surgeons out there.

Okay, finally, I have posted the Deion Sanders segment from his show,Prime Time Love, on the Oxygen Channel in the press videos section of this website.  The segment is pretty funny! 

I heard that Emina and I were finally on the Deion Sanders show last week.  Emina was called “Demina”, which is her new nickname at work.  Unfortunately, I missed the segment but I should have it posted once I get it sent to me within a few days.  I heard that the segment was pretty funny.  We have a good time at work every day so just wanted to have a little fun with this photo montage.

There is a great article in the Hair Transplant Forum International (a journal read by hair transplant surgeons who are a member of the ISHRS) entitled “Medical treatment of hairline and temple points”.  In this article, the manufacturers comments are discussed for Rogaine and Propecia.  Specifically, for Propecia, “There is not sufficient evidence that Propecia works for receding hairlines at the temples” according to Merck.  Also, McNeil PPC states for Rogaine:  ”Use:  to regrow hair on the top of the scalp, vertex only…5% minoxidil topical foam is not intended for frontal baldness or receding hairline”.  THESE STATEMENTS ARE WRONG.  Originally, the studies in the late 90s were focused on the vertex (crown) region.  Subsequent studies have proven the benefit (and these are large studies:  check out my medical solutions section of this website for details) of these FDA approved medications in the front of the scalp.  If anything, look at our extensive before and after gallery of individuals who have ONLY received medical management and the improvements that they have attained in the frontal and temporal region.  Enough said.