Major breakthrough in hair loss as study shows new product is more effective and safer than current treatments
A breakthrough drug could provide new hair hope for the millions of men and women dealing with baldness.
The medication, called PP405, triggered hair to regrow on the heads of men and women who were balding on the front and top of their scalp.
In the phase 2a trial, participants rubbed gel containing the medication onto their scalp daily and saw hair begin to regrow by week eight.
Overall, 31 percent of those who used the medication had a greater than 20 percent surge in hair density. In the placebo group, none saw any hair regrowth.
No side effects or adverse events were recorded, and the medication also was not detected in the blood, in a sign the drug may not affect other areas of the body.
This is a landmark discovery because currently available medications, finasteride and minoxidil, take around six months to have a visible impact. They can trigger some regrowth, but this hair tends to be much thinner than the hair that has been lost.
Both drugs are also able to enter the blood. They have previously been linked to erectile dysfunction and cardiovascular issues.
The trial was only meant to test the safety of the drugs, with researchers saying it was too early to say whether the medication could reverse hair loss.
But scientists at Pelage Pharmaceuticals, the company behind the drug, said the hair regrowth was ‘early validation of [the drug’s] regenerative potential’.
Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, pictured above in December 2024, started shaving his head in 2013 due to hair loss
Joe Rogan has publicly spoken about his hair loss and struggle with male pattern baldness
Dr Qing Yu Christina Weng, a dermatologist and chief medical officer involved in the trials, told Intelligencer: ‘We were blown away [by the results].
‘After just four weeks, you wouldn’t expect any separation between the treatment group and the placebo group. And not only were they growing new hair where there wasn’t any before, it wasn’t peach fuzz or baby hair — it was proper, thick… hair.’
All the participants in the trial had varying levels of androgenetic alopecia, or pattern baldness, a loss of hair primarily affecting the top and front of the scalp.
The drug has now been cleared to advance to phase 3 trials next year, the gold-standard test to determine whether treatments are effective.
The drug works by triggering high levels of activity of an enzyme called lactate dehydrogenase, which researchers say rekindles old hair follicles.
If successful in further trials, they said it could reach customers in the US by 2027 or 2028.
Dr Gary Linkov, a plastic surgeon who was not involved in the study, said online: ‘What people don’t often realize is that in most cases of hair loss, hair follicles are not dead, they’re usually in a dormant state. The architecture [for hair] is still there.
Dwayne Johnson, known as The Rock, began experiencing a receding hairline in his 20s and 30s
Jude Law has had a receding hairline since early in his career (pictured in Cannes, May 2023)
‘If we could find a way to flip that switch back on, get the stem cells working again, we might be able to regrow hair in areas that were previously thought to be permanently bald.
‘And this is where the… breakthrough happened.’
About 80 percent of men have hair loss at some point in their lives, with nearly a third recording noticeable hair thinning by age 30. Among women, estimates suggest that 40 percent have hair loss during their lives.
Currently, more than 80million people in the US are suffering from a form of hair loss, estimates suggest.
Despite this, however, there have been no major breakthroughs in hair loss medications since the 1970s and 80s after finasteride and minoxidil were approved.
They remain the only two drugs approved for hair loss.
The drugs have also been linked to concerning side effects, also including shifts in blood pressure and mood changes among some users.
Ralph Fiennes, who played Voldemort in Harry Potter, began to lose his hair in his early 30s. He is pictured above at a festival in Germany
Those seeking a restored hairline can opt for a hair transplant, but these are expensive, require weeks of recovery and are dependent on the amount of hair still available to be transferred.
The most recent results followed the phase 1 study carried out in 2023.
Dr Arash Mostaghimi, a dermatologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and a member of Pelage’s advisory board, said: ‘Despite affecting millions, hair loss has seen remarkably little progress in clinical research.
‘What’s compelling about PP405 is that it brings scientific rigor to a space that’s needed it for decades.
‘A well-tolerated, topically delivered therapy that shows measurable biological activity this early is rare. This could reshape how we think about clinical progress in hair growth.’
