Quiz: Discover the Cause of Your Hair Loss

What the Pattern of the Fall Reveals About the Cause

The way your hair is falling out is one of the most valuable clues to figuring out what's causing the problem.

Different causes of hair loss produce completely different patterns, as if each disease had its own visual signature.

When you can clearly identify the pattern of your hair loss, you eliminate several possibilities and get much closer to the correct diagnosis.

Let's understand each of these patterns in detail so you can identify exactly what's happening to you.

The first pattern is diffuse hair loss, which means loose strands are spread evenly throughout the head.

In this type of hair loss, also called "telogen effluvium," you can't pinpoint a specific area where hair is falling out more. Instead, strands fall out equally from all over the scalp.

When you comb or wash your hair, several loose strands come out, but they come from different parts of your head. You don't notice specific areas becoming thinner than others, but rather your hair becoming less dense overall.

This pattern of diffuse shedding usually points to temporary causes that affect the entire body at once.

For example, after having a baby, undergoing major surgery, having a very high fever, or experiencing a period of intense stress, the body may push many signals into the resting phase at once.

When these hairs fall out a few months later, they fall out in a scattered pattern because the event affected all the follicles on the scalp equally.

Nutritional deficiencies also often cause diffuse hair loss, because when important nutrients are lacking in the blood, all follicles suffer together.

The second pattern is completely different and is called patchy or patchy hair loss, also known as "alopecia areata." In this pattern, you can clearly see round or oval areas where there is simply no hair at all.

These areas are well-defined, with sharp edges, as if someone had cut circles in your hair.

Usually these bald patches appear suddenly; you don't notice the hair gradually thinning in that area, it simply falls out quickly and creates a bald patch.

The flaws can be small, the size of a coin, or they can be larger, depending on the severity of the case.

Some people have only one bald patch, while others develop several scattered across their scalp.

In rarer and more severe cases, a person may lose all the hair on their scalp or even in other areas of the body such as eyebrows, eyelashes, and body hair.

This pattern of circular bald patches is extremely characteristic of a specific condition called "alopecia areata".

This is an autoimmune disease, which means that the body's own defense system is mistakenly attacking the hair follicles as if they were dangerous invaders.

The immune system causes intense inflammation around the follicles in the affected areas, which makes the hair fall out rapidly in that region.

If you are seeing this pattern of circular cracks, it is very important to see a dermatologist because this specific condition requires targeted treatment.

The third pattern is the progressive thinning of the hair, called "androgenetic alopecia." In this case, what you notice is not necessarily a lot of hair falling out at once, but rather the hair becoming thinner, sparser, and weaker over time.

It is a gradual process that happens slowly over months or even years.

You may notice that your ponytail is thinner than it used to be, that you can see more of your scalp when you part your hair in the middle, or that specific areas are becoming more transparent.

In women, this thinning usually occurs more at the top of the head, in the crown area, while keeping the frontal hairline relatively preserved.

It's different from male pattern baldness, where hair loss typically occurs at the front and top, forming those characteristic receding hairlines.

This pattern of progressive thinning is typical of "androgenetic alopecia," which is also known as female pattern baldness or female pattern baldness.

This condition is mainly influenced by two factors: the genetics you inherited from your parents and the action of androgen hormones on the hair follicles.

Some people are born with follicles that are genetically sensitive to these hormones.

When hormones interact with these sensitive follicles, they cause the hair strands to become progressively thinner and shorter with each new growth cycle.

Over time, the follicles become smaller, producing hairs so fine they look almost like down, until eventually they may stop producing visible hairs altogether.

The fourth pattern is hair loss concentrated in specific areas, mainly on the hairline or the top of the head.

Unlike diffuse thinning, which happens slowly, in this case you notice that certain areas are losing hair more intensely than others.

The hairline at the front may be receding, or the top may be thinning while the sides and back remain fuller.

This pattern can also be a sign of "androgenetic alopecia," but in a slightly different presentation than the previous one.

It can also indicate "traction alopecia," which occurs when a person repeatedly wears very tight hairstyles, such as very tight braids, very tight buns, or very heavy hair extensions.

Constant tension on the hair ends up damaging the follicles in that specific area where the force is being applied.

Correctly identifying which of these patterns you are exhibiting is a crucial step in discovering the cause.

Some people may exhibit more than one pattern at the same time, which may indicate that more than one cause is acting simultaneously.

For example, a person may have underlying "androgenetic alopecia," which causes gradual thinning, and may also experience an episode of "telogen effluvium" after surgery, which causes additional diffuse hair loss.

In these cases, the fall may seem more intense because two different problems are happening at the same time.

That's why it's so important to carefully observe your hair and try to identify exactly how the hair loss is manifesting itself.

Take regular photos of the same area of your scalp with the same lighting so you can compare them over time.

Pay attention to whether the hair loss is uniform or concentrated in specific areas. Check for the formation of gaps or if it's more of a general thinning.

All this information will be extremely useful when you go to the doctor, because it will help the professional to better direct the tests and treatment.