How Bald Are You?

June 6, 2006

Introduced to measure at what stage of male pattern baldness men are at, the Norwood Scale is commonly used by hair transplant surgeons.

The Norwood-Hamilton scale was produced after a survey across 1,000 white adult male subjects in various degrees of baldness.

There are seven levels of loss in the Norwood scale:

• Norwood 1 - Normal head of hair with no visible signs of hair loss.
• Norwood 2 - The hair is receding at the temples forming a widows peak.
• Norwood 3 - The temples recede more and the frontal hairline thins.
• Norwood 4 - The bald spot appears on the crown and the frontal area recedes further
• Norwood 5 - The hair in the frontal area and the crow thin out further and start to join up.
• Norwood 6 - The final strip of hair which seperates the crown from the frontal area disappears.
• Norwood 7 - The classic "horseshoe" look - hair no longer exits on the frontal area and the crown and existing hair recedes towards the neck and the ears.

As a comparison, I was between a Norwood 5 and 6 before my first transplant.

After the hair transplant I was down to a Norwood 3.

The second transplant lowered my hairline and I was around a Norwood 2 after around 8 months.

My third transplant will put me between and Norwood 1 and 2.

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