Finasteride in the treatment of men with frontal male pattern hair loss☆,☆☆,★,★★
Section snippets
Study design
This was a multicenter, double-blind, placebo-controlled study conducted at 15 investigational sites in the United States. The study was approved by the institutional review board at each center, and all men gave written informed consent. After a 2-week, single-blind placebo run-in period, each subject was randomized to receive either oral finasteride 1 mg or placebo once daily for 12 months. All men who elected to enter the open extension received finasteride 1 mg daily during a second year of
Baseline characteristics
A total of 326 men with active mild to moderate hair loss/thinning in the frontal area enrolled in the study. Approximately 50% of the men also had some degree of vertex hair loss. The 2 treatment groups were similar in terms of all baseline characteristics (Table I).
Empty Cell Finasteride 1 mg (n = 166) Placebo (n = 160) Age (y) (mean ± SE) 33 ± 0.4 32 ± 0.4 Age (y) at which hair loss began (mean ± SE) 26 ± 0.6 25 ± 0.4 No. (%) of patients with family history* 132 (80.5)
DISCUSSION
During the past 50 years, the causes of male pattern hair loss have been more clearly defined, including its polygenic nature and association with androgens.1, 2 It is now clear that dihydrotestosterone is important in the pathogenesis of this condition, because men with an inherited deficiency of 5α-reductase and decreased dihydrotestosterone levels do not experience bitemporal recession or androgenetic alopecia, and finasteride has been shown to be efficacious in the treatment of men with
Acknowledgements
We thank the study coordinators at each site for their invaluable contributions to the study as well as the technical assistance of Mr Douglas Canfield in the development of the photographic procedures used in these clinical studies.
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The reported clinical study was entirely supported by Merck Research Laboratories, Merck & Co, Inc. Merck & Co, Inc is the company that manufactures and markets finasteride.
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A full conflict of interest statement from each of the authors has been submitted to the Editor. One or more of the authors have received payment for conducting the study, acted as consultants to the sponsoring company, received honoraria for lecturing, or owned stock in the sponsoring company.
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Reprint requests: Joanne Waldstreicher, MD, Clinical Research RY33-508, Merck Research Laboratories, 126 E Lincoln Ave, Rahway, NJ 07065.
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