Novel technique of follicular unit extraction hair transplantation with a powered punching device.

[BACKGROUND] A follicular unit extraction (FUE) method has been developed as one type of follicular unit transplantation (FUT) surgery that is a widely accepted hair restoration technique. Although FUE is considered to be more time consuming, depending on the operator's skill, and there are restrictions on patient candidacy, FUE has many advantages, including a small donor wound, less pain, and a slender graft without extra surrounding tissue.

[OBJECTIVE] To propose a novel powered FUE (P-FUE) technique.

[MATERIALS AND METHODS] To compare harvesting time and graft transection rate, FUE surgery was performed by manual FUE and P-FUE on male patients with alopecia.

[RESULTS] The P-FUE method had a shorter harvesting time (6.0 minutes for 100 grafts; 14.2 minutes for manual FUE) and lower graft transection rate (5.4% vs 17.3% with manual FUE). For 40 P-FUE cases, mean harvesting time for 100 grafts was 8.9+/-1.3 minutes. In 10 validated cases, the transection rate was 5.5%. Although there were limitations on patient selection with manual FUE, there were no restrictions on patient candidacy with the P-FUE method.

[CONCLUSION] The P-FUE method is a novel FUE procedure with many advantages over the conventional FUE technique.