Speaker 1:

Welcome to The Hair Loss Show, where two of Australia's leading hair restoration surgeons, Dr. Russell Knudsen and Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash, discuss issues relating to hair loss and the medical and surgical treatment of hair loss in both men and women.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Hi, everybody. Welcome to Episode 26 Of The Hair Loss Show. I'm Dr. Russell Knudsen.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

And I'm Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash. Today's episode has been requested quite a few times, so we thought we'd add that to the list. A lot of you have commented on it and we've promised that, so here's today's episode and it's on derma rolling.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Okay.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

All right? So-

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Why don't you write that up so we can... So, people can-

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

Yeah, yeah.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

See what we mean by beard roller.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

All right. So, beard roller is a device that you can buy and it is self-explanatory. Derm means skin, rolling means rolling something across the skin. So, these are devices that are designed to use little needles that you roll across the skin that actually puncture the skin. And that sounds horrible and it's not painless-

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

No.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

But, there's a logic behind it. It sounds like a torture, really. But, in fact, there is a logic behind it.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

Yeah. And the same logic is used on a number of different fronts. So, for example, laser therapy, not laser in hair, but if you're doing laser resurfacing of the skin. In essence, what you're doing with the derma rolling, is you're making small little punctures. Small, little injure points to the skin surface. And in doing so, what happens is there's an increased blood flow to the area. There's an increase in growth factors and inflammatory mediators that come to the area, that essentially stimulate the hair in that area to grow.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Stimulate the skin, [crosstalk 00:01:56] and hair is part of the skin. So, basically it's a controlled, superficial injury to the scalp with the hope that by initiating a healing process, the growth factors won't distinguish between healing the skin and strengthening the hair. So, the thing to understand about beard rollers is that it comes at different depths.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

Why?

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Why?

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

Why is the question? And the answer to that is different people have different dermal thickness. And so, you may need a longer needle to cause the same outcome. But, also the other flip side of that is if-

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

More injury.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

More injury. But, the larger the needle the more injury caused, the more injury caused, the more growth factors and inflammatory markers come to the area. But, like you've said, the flip side, or the dark side of that is the potential for injury there.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Okay. So, if people are saying, "Well, what would be the ideal depth?" Well, the short answer, is the target area you're trying for in the skin, is typically around about between one and one and a half millimetres under the skin. Because that's where the stem cells in the bulge area reside and this is what initiates growth in the hair follicles. So, it sends signals to the base of the hair, but it comes from this zone, what we call the bulge, which is around about one to one and a half millimetres under the skin.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

So I've drawn rudimentary sort of picture of a [crosstalk 00:03:31]

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

It's not down here, it's up here. All right. So ideally for hair, what you would do is you look for something in the one millimetre depth range or the 1.5 millimetre depth range, because that means that the injury is in the area where the bulge area and those stem cells reside.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Now, if you're doing the skin rejuvenation, which is another reason why people use beard rollers as a skin rejuvenation, you don't necessarily have to go quite as deep for your skin rejuvenation, because you're trying to work on a different part of the skin.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

But I would argue, yes, they come in needles that are either half a millimetre deep or one millimetre deep, or one and a half millimetres deep, I would argue that you certainly don't need anything more than one and a half millimetres deep, but something in the one to one and a half millimetre range makes sense.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

But the risk of that is that the longer the needle, the more likely you damage the hair follicles.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

That's where you wouldn't go, see down here we're at the three, three and a half millimetre mark, you do not want to be down here.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

But I mean, different people, we don't know where that is. [crosstalk 00:04:41]

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Well, we operate on a lot of patients sot's rare to have somebody with a bulb if you like, that's at one and a half millimetres. That's pretty rare.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

But you can. One of the things that you can cause with derma rolling is a temporary shed. Because if the needle is here, that's fine but if you slice through the hair follicle-

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Not only that if you put enough inflammatory factors in there, then you can shed just as a response to the inflammatory factors. So more is not necessarily better, I guess, is what we're saying here. So this is not something you spend an hour a day doing. I mean, that's really just not a sensible protocol to do because you're just overdoing it, right. It takes 24, 48 hours for all that healing to really kick in. So my advice is you wouldn't want to do this more than two or three times a week, and you just don't want to overdo it, right? Because if you over inflame the area, you may be doing more harm than good.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

So the next question then is, I mean, do you recommend it as part of your regular routine?

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

The closest thing that it is to in the way it works is PRP platelet-rich plasma. That's the closest example. And one of the things, we've talked about PRP before and said well it's a bit confusing, because one of the things we don't know about PRP is whether the needle going in to inject the PRP is doing more good than the PRP itself that's injected. So the very fact that we have to inject PRP in the scalp means we're essentially doing a beard roller process. So I don't rank them at the top end of our treatment chain because they are mildly invasive, right. We actually are doing something painful, it is penetrating the skin, which is not going to cause infection. If you've got a clean beard roller you're not going to cause infection, but you are penetrating the skin. And if you're creating too much bleeding with it, well, you're potentially doing some damage. So I'd say it's a kind of an add on that we can use for some people once we've tried other things that are less invasive.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

So, I mean, I think that's the important thing. We're not against derma rolling by any stretch of the imagination, but it's not probably the first thing that we would suggest on our armoury of management plan of how to manage an individual [crosstalk 00:07:08]

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

This sits on the stimulation side of the equation, but we're behind things like minoxidil and laser therapy.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

That's right. So derma rolling, good, it stimulates the hair. So you can get a good outcome that way. There are risks to it though. You can experience a short term shedding if you damage the hair follicle in that process. And there's no real way of controlling that or preventing that, it just depends on where you [crosstalk 00:07:35]

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Well, the thing to remember about people with balding is that the skin is thin as part of the miniaturisation process, everything in the skin is miniaturising as part of the balding process. So we know that the depth of skin in the bald areas is not quite the same as healthy skin where we have no hair loss. So we have to be a little bit careful. I know this is a self initiated treatment, and you can buy these things on the internet, which is absolutely fine, but a little bit is good too much, maybe not.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

And the last thing I'd say about it is I do see people who are doing derma rolling, and it's got to be used in the right area as well. So you've got to have an area that has some early miniaturisation. If you've got a bald patch, doing all the derma rolling you want is not going to regrow hair.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Exactly. So that's either at the hairline for people who have lost their hairline. If you're in an area with no hair, forget it. Remember what we said before, if the hair shrinks to less than 50% of its original shaft thickness, the diameter, then we can't make it a fully healthy hair again.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

So again, you're looking to put the beard roller through the mildly thinning areas rather than the true bald areas. And as long as you do it carefully comb your head with a bit of separation, maybe wet your hair before you do it would be good too because that does tend to clump the hairs together for you. So do it with your hair wet, it might make it easier to roll through the area so that you're rolling in the one direction, forward, backwards or sideways. I think forward backwards is easy for most people and wet your hair beforehand and don't cause too much bleeding.

Dr. Vikram Jayaprakash:

Good. So hopefully that answers your questions about derma rolling. Please, if you've enjoyed the videos, carry on watching, please give us a like and subscribe and forward it on to whoever you feel might benefit. But thank you very much for watching and we'll see you on the next episode.

Dr. Russell Knudsen:

Thank you guys.

Trav White:

So, my beard has always been patchy and it's mainly been in the sideburn and cheek area. And I've had a patchy beard since I was able to grow one. For as long as I can remember, I would always have to shave the patchy parts on the sideburn and the cheek and have this disconnected beard style, because my sideburns and the cheek parts just would never grow into a full beard like I always want it to. And I'd always see pictures of Jake Gyllenhaal or Chris Pine with these full beards and I would just wish that my patches would grow in. So, finally one day I decided to stop ignoring it and try to fix it but I didn't want to use me minoxidil, which for those who don't know minoxidil is Rogaine basically. So, I don't have anything against people using minoxidil and I have seen it be incredibly effective on patchy beards on other men but I've also heard horror stories, right?

Trav White:

Of guys getting heart palpitations, blood pressure dropping too low, their heart starts spontaneously racing. And I do have a family history of heart disease. And my heart already has PACs and PVCs pretty much daily. I have seen a cardiologist for it and was told that they're totally benign but I still just try to limit anything that can potentially mess with my heart.

Trav White:

So, I decided to go a natural serum route that I actually created myself based on tonnes of different studies I've read. And for the last 60 days I've been doing a daily beard patch fix routine and I've started seeing new vellus hairs growing where the patches used to be. Now to be clear, it's still is patchy. Like it's not fully in yet as much as I want it to be. And it's definitely not where I want to be yet. But for the first time in my life, I have started seeing my patches begin to fill in and that I've never seen before. So, this video's meant to be a quick tutorial on how I've been able to do that naturally without using any minoxidil. Let's get into it.

Speaker 2:

Oh.

Speaker 3:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Oh.

Trav White:

What's up guys? Trav right here. Welcome back to the channel. We cover the science of style and grooming. If you enjoy those types of topics, please hit that like and subscribe button. And also, come on over to my Mannered Manes beard and hair growth community on Facebook. If you have any questions or any struggles, that's the place to ask it. So the link is in the description. Also, there is a super loyal 16% of you guys, watching these videos who are subscribed to my channel and I really appreciate that. I am on a goal to hit 60K subs by the end of 2021 and 84% of people who are watching my videos are not subscribed. So, even if a small portion of those guys smash that subscribe button, we would hit that goal and I'd really appreciate it. So, if you find this video valuable then definitely, please hit that like and subscribe button it's totally free and you can unsubscribe whenever you want.

Trav White:

So, the first thing I need to introduce you to is a beard roller. What is a beard roller? This is a beard roller. So, it is basically a microneedle roller with hundreds, 540 to be exact, of small needles that make micro punctures in your skin, in your hair follicles. So, the beard roller needles can come in a wide variety of lengths. Ranging from 0.25 millimetres all the way to one and a half millimetres. However, if it's a one millimetre or higher needle length, then those are reserved for professional aesthetician use and not an at home DIY use. And these lengths are used for more than just hair growth. Estheticians use one millimetre or higher derma rollers on people's faces who want to get rid of things like acne scars or wrinkles, as it does help promote new collagen growth over time. So, there are many uses for a beard roller outside of beards.

Trav White:

They're used quite a bit in skincare. But getting back to beards, I would suggest using a 0.5 millimetre beard roller for beards. And it's a little longer, it can reach the root of your beard follicles better to promote more blood flow. And I don't think 0.25 or 0.3 millimetres are quite long enough. You also want to make sure that it has titanium needles as opposed to stainless steel. The titanium needles do stay sharper for longer and you won't need to replace it as often. So, a common question I get is, "Can you use your beard beard roller on your scalp as well, to fight balding?" So, your scalp hair follicles are much deeper than your beard follicles. So, if you want to use a beard roller for hair loss on your head, then I'd recommend using at least a one and a half millimetre needle length and using a dermapen instead of a beard roller. A dermapen goes in vertically and it punctures. And it's much more effective than rolling because the rolling ones tend to tear the follicle as it rolls across the scalp.

Trav White:

Whereas dermapens tend to enter and exit vertically much, much cleaner. But getting back to beards, most beard rollers for beards are sold on Amazon between 0.25 and 0.5 millimetres. Again, I'd recommend getting the 0.5 millimetre one. I'll leave a link in the description for the exact one that I bought so you guys can use it. But another common question is, "How do beard rollers work to promote hair growth? What is the science behind all of this?" So, the theory is that the needles make tiny punctures in the skin and in the follicle and this triggers vitamin and hormone-rich blood to flow to the damaged area to heal it, resulting in new collagen and keratin production in that area. And if you do this enough times, over time, you can essentially wake up the dormant hair follicle and begin the telogen phase of hair growth, which can stimulate new vellus hairs, where there wasn't any before.

Trav White:

So, there is actually evidence showing that this is effective on hair regrowth in men with male pattern baldness and they're even more effective when they are paired with minoxidil on your scalp. So, it does make sense to translate some of those results to beards as well. But I wasn't able to actually find any study that just focused on beards and microneedling, but I did find plenty of studies on microneedling on your scalp and it promoting hair growth. I'll leave those in the description as well if you want to fact check me. Another common question I get is, "Will this beard roller cause bleeding?" No, it won't. It's not painful at all. It feels like slight pressure on your face, but it doesn't break the skin blood barrier, it doesn't cause any sort of pain. It all happens beneath the surface or the deeper layers of your skin.

Trav White:

So, how do you use a beard roller? So, step one is you're going to want to sterilise it. You want to soak it in 70% isopropyl alcohol for 60 to 90 seconds before applying it to your face. Just to make sure that the needles are clean. Step two, you're going to roll it on your face in three different sets of 10 to 20 rolls across your beard where you're seeing patches. You're going to do 10 to 20 horizontally, you're going to do 10 to 20 vertically, and then you're going to do 10 to 20 diagonal rolls. So how much pressure should you apply? I would say, not much. The beard roller will do most of the work. You don't need to shove it in your face and really get in there. You just need to place it gently and roll it up, down left, right, diagonal in all directions, 10 to 20 times each until you've really punctured that patchy area.

Trav White:

So, step three is going to be, to rinse it off with warm water and then sterilise it again afterwards in that 70% isopropyl alcohol. This time, I would leave it in for three to five minutes and then store it safely in a beard roller case. I have this one right here that came in the packaging on Amazon. As you can see, it's just stored nicely in this case here. Treat this like you would treat a toothbrush, right? This is yours. Don't share this with anyone. You don't want to share a needle with someone, right? So, you don't want to share your beard roller with anyone as well. So, step four is that, now that you've made the tiny punctures in your beard follicles, this is when applying that growth serum is really going to be most effective because it can penetrate deeper into the root.

Trav White:

So, most of your beard growth kits on Amazon will also come with usually a biotin oil or a turmeric oil or something to add on, that they sell. They sell serums within their beard kits. And that's cool. You guys can use that if you want. Those may or may not stimulate beard growth. I haven't read too much studies on those. Now, this is my minoxidil-free beard growth serum that I created and it's getting low. So, I do need to refill it. But essentially, this is the recipe. It's two tablespoons of cold pressed, organic, pumpkin seed oil. And this is going to be used as your carrier oil, right? I put this in this little container that I found from Amazon, which by the way, I'm going to link to everything in the description. So you guys can go get it for yourself.

Trav White:

I chose pumpkin seed oil as my carrier oil because I did read a few studies about it having hair growth effectiveness in mice. And so I figured, "Hey, it's worth trying." And then for the next three oils, I added peppermint oil, rosemary oil and lavender oil, right? And if you do get the therapeutic grade essential oils, it's really important that you dilute them in a carrier oil, like a fattier oil, before applying it directly to your face because the therapeutic great essential oils can really irritate your skin at 100% potency. So I dilute them. I put about five to seven drops, in about two tablespoons of pumpkin seeded oil. Then I take a soft bristle toothbrush, I dip it in the oil and I gently massage it into the area that I just microneedled. I also do this to my patches on the days that I don't microneedle as well.

Trav White:

So, I apply it once in the morning, once at night, before bed for about 30 seconds every single day. And then, on the days that I do use a beard roller, I apply it right after I dermaroll the beard patches. So, how often should you use your beard roller? So, for the 0.5 millimetre needle, I use it three times per week. I use it Monday, Wednesday and Friday. But if you've never used a beard roller before, I'd recommend starting out with a two time per week schedule, once in maybe the beginning of the week and once in the end of the week, just to see how your skin responds to it and to give those punctures a chance to heal up. I'm going to pull up a picture right here. Here's a before and after of my beard after using a beard roller for 45 days, three times per week and applying my growth serum, one to two times per day, every single day.

Trav White:

So, as you can see, even though my patches are still visible, there is new growth that has started slowly coming in on those patches. And I'm on day 60 now and if you look at the results of where I am now, there is new vellus hairs growing, my sideburns are much thicker, my cheek is much thicker here. Same on this side, this side's even moreso. The patches are just filling in a lot more. This is my much thicker than it's ever been. My sideburn is thicker than it's ever been. It's definitely filling in to a degree it's never filled in before. These used to be just bear, just no hair at all. So, there's definitely been new hair growth and it's been really cool to see. But I am on day 60 now, right? And the results are pretty much still the same as day 45, but I am keeping the faith that more will come over time.

Trav White:

It may take up to six months of consistent application to really see results. One mistake I do see a lot of guys making is that, they give up after 20 to 30 days because they aren't seeing any results really fast, right? Stimulating new hair growth is a very slow process and it takes a lot of time. It will probably take me four to six months to really see results coming in. And I'm sure the results will probably be faster if I did start using minoxidil instead, maybe, maybe not, I don't know. But again, I'm trying to stay away from the minoxidil use and keep in mind that these results are totally anecdotal, right? These are my results in one study. And you may or may not get the same results, but it's definitely worth a shot if you're wanting to fill in your beard patches.

Trav White:

So, I'll link to all of the products that I use in the description. I found everything on Amazon. So, you guys can just go shop on Amazon and get it. It's not expensive at all. I am happy with my progress so far and I am very excited about continuing to do this. It's become a habit. It doesn't really feel like a chore anymore. And hair growth has always been a marathon, not a sprint and filling in beard patches is the same thing. And you might be too young also. That might be something, as a younger guy trying to grow a beard. If you're 18 to 25 and you have a tonne of beard patches, you might just need to wait. I'm 30 years old right now and I still have patches. So, some guys need to wait till they're 35, 40 for a lot of their beard hair to start coming in much thicker. So, don't lose faith guys. Keep it up. And again, everything's linked to the description. If you guys like this video, give it a thumbs up and I'll see you guys in the next one. Peace.

Dan C Bearded:

Hey guys, welcome to my channel. My name is Dan C Bearded, and this is the channel where I take pride in covering every aspect of having a beard. If you like beards, consider subscribing to the channel. I would greatly appreciate that. If you don't like beards, that's okay too. Thanks for stopping by today for whatever reason that may be.

Dan C Bearded:

Well, since the beginning of my channel and my beard journey, one of the most popular topics revolves around this thing called minoxidil, AKA Rogaine, using it on your face and then also a little aspect that goes with it, which is dermarolling. Now, this is one of the biggest niches in the beard world, on YouTube, on Facebook, there are huge groups, huge followings that are all about minoxidil. Now I've done a tonne of research, but I've never done a dedicated video on minoxidil or dermarolling for the simple fact that I've never tried it.

Dan C Bearded:

I didn't think it would come off properly, me giving this information, and a lot of people being like, "Dude, that's easy for you to say. Look at that beard. Look at it." I know. I understand. That's why I've never made it. So I wanted to go out and find someone that I trusted that I really respect that does use minoxidil and is really big into research and I found my buddy, George, who runs the YouTube channel called The Bearded Boost. Please go check that out. Support him. Give him a subscribe, especially if you are into minoxidil, especially if you want to follow that journey and learn all about it because there is science behind it. There are possible side effects. The results do vary, but George is going to do a great job breaking down every aspect in a really kind of packed in video. And if you like that, then go explore his channel and rather than just having this video, you're going to have a whole library full of knowledge. So we're going to go check in with George, then I'll be back for the conclusion.

George:

Hey guys, what's up? My name is George. Welcome to Dan C Bearded's channel. Now in this video, we're going to discuss minoxidil. What is minoxidil? Well, minoxidil is often marketed at Walmart, Target, and all those big chain grocery or our drug stores as Rogaine. Rogaine is a very interesting thing because many times we just pass over the aisle saying, "Hey, that stuff doesn't work for the hair," and yada-yada. And so you might not even think twice, but let's hear out the story. So Rogaine was originally invented in the 1980s as an initial attempt to lower participants' blood pressure. Now after a couple of studies and after a specific amount of time went by, they started to see something. It wasn't exactly lowering blood pressure, but what it was doing is actually regrowing hair in specific areas, specifically the vertex of the scalp, also known as the crown.

George:

Now fast forward a couple of years later and it is now marketed without a prescription over the counter as a regrowth formula. What does that mean? Well, it's not exactly going to grow new hair, but it will regrow hair that was originally there. Now, why would you care about that? Maybe you're bald. Maybe you have a beautiful set of hair. So why would you care about minoxidil? Well, I'm going to tell you why right now. Unlike when you're regrowing hair on your scalp, understand this. When you're on minoxidil for your hair, you need to consistently be applying it, otherwise what happens is whatever amount of hair you regrew will fall out. The main reason why you are going to see a handful of people on YouTube, on Facebook, on Instagram posting their minoxidil beard journeys is because of how potent it is in actually growing facial hair. Despite our genetic limits or our genetic barriers, we can actually grow hair using minoxidil because of the process that it takes the hair.

George:

What do I mean by that? Well, it goes through a couple of phases. The main ones being vellus, transitional, shedding, and terminal. So unlike when you are applying to the scalp where you have to apply consistently or risk losing whatever has regrown, when you're applying minoxidil to your face, what happens is that it'll go through the phases and once you hit what is called a terminal phase, whatever hairs turn course, dark and thick are actually going to stick around forever. Once you get off the minoxidil, what's going to happen is that you're going to proceed to keep growing it. It now becomes your natural hair. So the words of minoxidil beard journey or just that, it is a journey to get to the terminal hair. And of course, it's not like minoxidil was going to give you a beard necessarily like then C Bearded, but it'll definitely take you to those genetic limits that otherwise you would've never reached.

George:

So we go through the vellus stage, we go through the transitional stage, that then falls out and sheds. And then that's when the terminal hairs hit. Now again, minoxidil does work for your facial hair with your genetic limitations in mind of course. Now moving forward from that, it can't all be fun and games. There are some downsides. Some of the downsides include the time that it actually takes for minoxidil to take your hairs from vellus, to transitional, to shedding, to then terminal. Guys, the minoxidil beard journey sometimes takes six months, eight months, one to two years. Now, for those of us that are more impatient, things like a hair transplant will definitely be much more beneficial for you. But if you can wait it out for a year, for two years, maybe even three years, you will definitely see amazing results and be able to keep mostly all of the gains that have turned into what is called terminal.

George:

Now, because it is a drug much like taking Tylenol, much like taking anything over the counter, we have to be very, very careful with how we are doing it and making sure that we are doing this in a responsible way. It's a drug. So how your body responds to it is completely individual to the individual. Yes. What does that mean? Well, maybe you don't experience side effects, but maybe someone like me does. Maybe your neighbour doesn't experience side effects, but his neighbor's neighbours do. Minoxidil does give hope to the patchy bearded individuals such as myself who are going through it, but it doesn't come without a price. What is the price? Well, like I said earlier, there are side effects and it does take a really long time. So now let's get into some of the side effects. They include face bloating. They include heart palpitations. They include unwanted hair growth from all different sides of where you originally grow hair. So for example, for me, I saw some hair growth around my years that I didn't have before.

George:

I've been on the minoxidil journey for about six months. I documented all on my YouTube channel and have seen a couple of side effects, some of which include heart palpitations, some of which include lots of hair growth in my ears, as I said earlier. Now most of these side-effects have gone away over time. Heart palpitations, for example, is noted by many users to go away within the second month or by reducing the amount of recommended minoxidil that you are applying to your face on a daily basis. As a side note, guys, your minoxidil results itself will also be contingent on your genetics. Around this area specifically, I seem to be growing what are called vellus hairs as mentioned earlier. Now, the vellus hairs seem to be growing around here, around here, around my neck, around here, but they seem to be completely missing around here.

George:

Now, that might just mean that that is my specific genetic limit, rather no amount of minoxidil is going to grow new hair here where my genetics don't allow it. Now, apparently my genetics do however allow for my moustache to connect to my cheek contingent on all of these vellus hairs going, what is called terminal. Now, as I go further into my beard journey, I will likely shed off most, if not all of the vellus hairs, they will then transition over to terminal status, in which case they become more coarse. My whole point of telling you guys this is not to scare you with the side effects and not just to brag about the little bit of results that I've had, but also just to inform you guys. This is a channel. This is a platform that Dan has created based on just that, giving you guys the best information possible.

George:

Me personally, I try to do as much research as possible and although it is limited in terms of exposure, minoxidil is very effective. It's very effective. And I have a number of people, not only on YouTube, not only on Facebook, that are on the minoxidil beard journey and have much, much better results than I do. But the only difference between them getting those results and myself is that they were on the minoxidil beard journey a lot longer than I have been so far. Now guys, a lot of times when you are on the minoxidil beard journey, the beard roller is a common tool to use. Now, why would you want to use microneedling on your beard? Microneedling, AKA dermarolling, AKA collagen induction therapy was initially intended for that, to produce collagen, in which case your face will reduce the wrinkles, in which case you will reduce the acne scars, and in which case you are battling one of the common side effects of minoxidil, which is dark circles around the eyes.

George:

Why does minoxidil produce dark circles around the eyes? Well, minoxidil is commonly known as a collagen inhibitor and because it is a collagen inhibitor, you will often see individuals using a beard roller in an effective way to reduce the dark circles and increase the amount of college that they are producing. Now, do you have to use a beard roller with minoxidil? No. There are a number of people that don't experience that side effect, therefore will never touch the beard roller to begin with. Me personally, I use it sometimes. Sometimes I don't. It's not really essential. It is just a supplement to my minoxidil beard journey. All right, guys. So guys, thank you so much for hearing me out. If you made it this far into the video, I appreciate you. I appreciate Dan for willing to actually collab with me. I do run a YouTube channel. So if you guys want to go and check it out, learn a little bit more on minoxidil, be my guest. It is The Bearded Boost on YouTube. So, thank you guys and now I'll give it over to Dan.

Dan C Bearded:

I think this is one of those videos you need to go back and watch 2, 3, 4 times. Not because I need the views, but hey, I'll take the views. Give me all the views. But mainly because there is so much information packed in a short amount of time. I don't know if you guys realised it watching it that first time, but George crushed it. George, from me to you, thank you, man. You put so much content into that short video clip. I really appreciate it and I also appreciate everything you do for the community. So again, thank you my friend. It does not go unnoticed. Now, guys watching out there, please leave a comment down below.

Dan C Bearded:

First and foremost, have you tried minoxidil and what was your journey like? What was your progress? Did you have side effects? But also give us information. Don't just say, "Oh, it sucks. I didn't get anything out of it." Well, were you consistent? Were you doing what you were supposed to? Make sure you include all of that down below. Hey, did you try dermarolling? Is it not for you? I call that aerating the face. When somebody comes out and aerates your lawn or you do it yourself, that's what I think it is. But again, I've never tried either of these so I've never felt really good or really right making a video and say this happens and this happens because I just haven't tried it, but I'm so glad that I have someone like George to be able to talk to you guys.

Dan C Bearded:

Hopefully George will be down in the comments commenting from his channel, giving you guys the answers you're looking for, or at least that he knows and he's capable of. So please, anything, minoxidil, dermarolling related, this is the video. Let's ask. Let's explore. And who knows? Maybe your questions will lead to a future video on this topic. So thank you guys. Thank you, George. Again, if you're new to the channel, consider subscribing, go subscribe to The Bearded Boost. Dan C Bearded, stay bearded and stay positive.

Paul Donofrio:

The beard roller, my thoughts, questions, and reach out to the community, coming up next.

Paul Donofrio:

What's up, guys? I'm Paul Donofrio back with you from GroomReviews. We're getting you comfortable, confident and clean in grooming. And this channel, we're bringing you everyday grooming product reviews. So if you're new here, be sure to subscribe and make sure to hit that notification bell to stay on top of all of our latest videos. You can also check us out on our website at groomreviews.com.

Paul Donofrio:

For this video, I decided to put my beard trimming on hold so that I can let my beard grow out a little bit more for better demonstration on a future product video. That said, I want to switch things up and focus on a product that I'm hoping many of you out in the GroomReviews community have had a chance to use and can share your experience and results. I'm talking about the beard roller.

Paul Donofrio:

I wanted to put this video together and reach out to you guys in the GroomReviews community, [inaudible 00:00:58] a recent conversation I had with a friend who's really struggling with his inability to grow a full beard. He has a lot of patchy areas and it's just really wearing on him and taking a toll mentally. He told me he's been trying to use beard supplements, beard growth supplements, doing a whole horde of things and it's just not working for him. And he came out and he asked me, he said, my next step is I'm thinking of using the beard roller. What do you think about it? And I honestly looked at him and I said, what is the beard roller? Because I've never heard of the beard roller before he mentioned it.

Paul Donofrio:

Now for many of you out there, I'm sure you've known about the dermalroller for a while now, but for me, this is just something that's been off the radar. And I'm just getting into the research on it and trying to understand how this product is working and what the results are that people are getting out there. For those of you in the same boat as myself, let me explain a little bit about what I've learned about dermarolling, also known as micro-needling.

Paul Donofrio:

The beard roller is basically this rolling drum here, and it's lined with hundreds of these micro-needles. And it's attached to a handle, and this is used to roll across your skin. These needles are meant to create tiny little injury sites along the surface of the skin, which then prompts the body to kick into gear to repair and heal those areas.

Paul Donofrio:

The top layer of our skin is the epidermis and right underneath that is the dermis. That's where we have the blood circulation, the blood flowing, feeding to the skin, as well as the components of collagen and elastin. Collagen basically build strength. The elastin creates that elasticity. When we're using this and we're getting in there and we're poking those little injury sites, it's basically activating blood supply to move to the area, the collagen to move in, and the elastin to move in, which creates a better environment to regrow hair, fixed skin that may be loose or you might be wrinkly, and it's just an overall healthy way to work into those areas that may not have the best things going right now.

Paul Donofrio:

The beard roller does come in different needle sizes. From what I've seen, it comes from anywhere from 0.2 millimetres up to about three millimetres, but if you're using it at home, you want to stay within the 0.2 to 0.5 millimetre range. That's good if you're trying to use this on the beard or you're trying to use it on the face, but anything above that, you want to have a specialist handle it. You don't want to be doing this yourself. You can go too far in and actually cause more damage than you intended. So the beard roller that I have here, I actually picked up on Amazon for around $12 or so, but the needles on this are 0.25 millimetre, and they're titanium needles that are built into this device.

Paul Donofrio:

Now with use of this product, there are several key instructions you want to keep in mind. The first thing you want to make sure is that you're sterilising these needles in order to prevent infection. You want to make sure you have an alcohol solution. You put this in it for about five minutes or so, and make sure that these are just sterilised and clean before and after you use. You want to picture this almost as you're using a toothbrush or something of that nature. You don't want to be sharing this with somebody else. This is your personal device, and that's how you want to treat it.

Paul Donofrio:

It's also recommended that you first wash your face with some kind of antimicrobial cleanser to remove your oils and dirt from your face so as you're not actually rubbing it all over when you're using the product. So when you're using the beard roller, make sure you're applying gentle pressure against the skin. This isn't meant to puncture and cause bleeding. So if that happens, you're pushing too hard, but you are meant to feel some slight pressure on there. It shouldn't hurt you while you're using this, but you will feel the needles against the skin.

Paul Donofrio:

As far as rolling direction, there's three directions that are recommended when using this product. You want to be going horizontal to side to side, vertical up and down, and diagonal. So when you're doing this, you want to do probably five to 10 rolls on each area. You want to make sure you're going with the roller. You're not twisting it. You're not turning it. It's going to cause more damage to the skin with these needles that are in here.

Paul Donofrio:

Right now I'm just going to jump in and I'm going to test this out on my beard, just to show you guys the different directions to use this product. So here's using the beard roller horizontally. You pick a spot, go in, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. And move up to the next one, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Just gentle pressure, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Now, if you want to go vertical, pick another spot. So we'll go in here, and now we'll go diagonal.

Paul Donofrio:

As far as how much to use the beard roller, what I'm seeing is as a beginner, you want to probably just use this once a week, see how the product's working on your skin, see how you're reacting to it. And then after you get comfortable with it, you can move to probably twice a week. So as far as using this on longer beard hair, what I'm hearing out there is that you can wet or dampen the beard first, that will reduce the risk of actually getting these needles stuck and pulling at your hair while you're doing it. Another method is you can actually just trim down the beard to a length that's manageable, where it doesn't have a chance to stick, or you can just shave it to the point where it's just down in the skin and you can really see those areas where you don't see any stubble growing, and that's the areas you want to attack with this.

Paul Donofrio:

Another thing that people with long beard hair prefer to do is just go in the direction of the beard hair growth. This reduces the risk of it snagging on the way back up. So they'll just come up here, and they go down, 1, let's stop, go back. Just like that. Some people have said that using minoxidil, which is the male pattern baldness solution, when they use that in combination with this beard roller, they see great results, increased hair growth. Whoever out there has used this with minoxidil, please let us know your experience, your methods, your result, and how you're doing to this point. From what I've read, you should not dermaroll and then use minoxidil right after that. You should wait at least 24 hours before applying the minoxidil so you don't have an increased heart rate and things of that nature.

Paul Donofrio:

Aside from hair regeneration, the beard roller is really best known for its skin rejuvenation benefits and its overall healthy benefits for the skin. A few of the do nots with the beard roller are do not use this if you're having an acne breakout, make sure you don't use this on the lips or the eyes, do not use this on open sores or wounds. Make sure if you're allergic to metal, you don't want to be using this, be cleaned in that alcohol solution and you keep it to yourself to reduce the risk of infection.

Paul Donofrio:

When you've finished using this, I've heard some mixed results on what you should be doing. Some people are saying put on some kind of vitamin serum or you can put on a cleanser, wash it up. Others say give it some time to settle in and then put some kind of topical solution on there. But that again is something where I defer to you guys out there in the community. Let me know what you're using, what's working for you and what kind of results you're seeing.

Paul Donofrio:

On this channel I'm going to be honest with you. I'm not going to pretend like I'm an expert in every product that I'm using. With this product, I definitely know the time it takes to use. I know what it's going to take for people out there to get experience with it, test it out and see results. It's not something I can just use right now, one time, two times and give you guys a review of and say, Hey, this is a product that's working great, go out and buy it. This is really a product that takes months to figure out, is it really working?

Paul Donofrio:

That said, I feel this is an opportunity to reach out to you guys in the community who have experience with the beard roller, who may have been using this for months or even maybe even years, and you're seeing great results with it. That's what I want to hear about in the comments. I want to hear, what's your experience? What are your methods? Is there a particular method that's working better than another? Are you seeing great results or are you not seeing great results? Anything we can do to help strengthen this community. I want to help those people out there that are struggling right now with patchiness. And I can't really do that myself based on the time period, but I think we can all come together as a whole and make us stronger with the support of those of you out there who have experience.

Paul Donofrio:

All right, guys, thanks so much for sticking with me. I greatly appreciate you guys, help me out and support me on this video. If you have an experience with the beard roller, please let us know in the comments below. Make sure to check me out on Instagram, @groomgeviews. I appreciate you being here, and I'll catch you next time.