Original articleA randomized double-blind placebo-controlled pilot study to assess the efficacy of a 24-week topical treatment by latanoprost 0.1% on hair growth and pigmentation in healthy volunteers with androgenetic alopecia
Section snippets
Study design
This was a monocenter, double-blind, randomized pilot study to assess the efficacy of a 24-week topical treatment with latanoprost 0.1% on hair growth and pigmentation in healthy volunteers. The subjects were randomized on location: each subject applied latanoprost on one investigational site and placebo on the other. The trial was conducted at the Clinical Research Center for Hair and Skin Science at the Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany, in 2003 in accordance with the Declaration of
Results
The 16 subjects received the investigational products at two minizones, comparable at randomization, on the frontotemporal regions during 24 weeks. The quantitative data at baseline were also comparable as measured by TrichoScan (Tricholog GmbH).
Discussion
This proof of concept study investigated the influence of latanoprost versus placebo on hair growth and pigmentation in healthy volunteers with androgenetic alopecia. Differences in favor of latanoprost could be seen in the clinical evaluation from 12 weeks of treatment onward (n = 3), and in 50% of the study population (n = 8) at 24 weeks. The differences concerned hair density, associated with increased hair pigmentation (n = 4) and thickness (n = 3).
The investigational sites differed in hair
Conclusion
In this pilot study, latanoprost significantly increased overall hair density and the number of vellus and terminal hairs compared with baseline and the placebo-treated area after 8 weeks of topical treatment. This suggests that latanoprost could be useful for treating androgenetic alopecia. More research is needed to determine the optimal dose and treatment duration of latanoprost or other candidate prostaglandin analogues.
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Supported by a research grant for the L’Oréal Civatte Professorship (Dr Blume-Peytavi).
Conflicts of interest: None declared.