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What Is Trichotillomania?

Trichotillomania is an impulse control disorder that involves recurrent, irresistible urges to pull out hair from one’s own scalp, beard, eyebrows, eyelashes, pubic hair or other areas of the body, despite trying to stop.

The sites may vary over time. It is usually referred to as an obsessive- compulsive disorder but most recently, it has been conceptualized as part of a family of “body-focused repetitive behaviors” along with skin picking and nail biting.

Hair pulling from the scalp often leaves patchy bald spots, which causes significant distress and can interfere with self-image, social or work functioning.

Common Symptoms

The most common symptoms often include:

Repeatedly pulling hair out, typically from the scalp
An increased sense of tension before pulling and a sense of pleasure after the hair is pulled
Shortened hair or thinned or bald areas on the scalp or other areas of the body, including sparse or missing eyelashes or eyebrows
Biting, chewing or eating pulled-out hair (trichophagia). This is a very dangerous condition that needs to be treated because hair is not digestible in the stomach and can build up into a hair ball. This can severely irritate the stomach lining leading to severe ulceration
Playing with pulled-out hair or rubbing it across lips or face

Trichotillomania probably results from a combination of genetic and environmental factors. It usually develops just before or during the early teens and is often a lifelong problem. Infants also can be prone to hair pulling and if affects far more women than men.

People who have trichotillomania may also have other disorders, such as depression, anxiety or obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and it is treated with psychotherapy (cognitive-behavior therapy, medications, support groups, alternative therapies etc.)

What can you do about Trichotillomania?

Since most of the trichotillomania causes indicate a psychosomatic disorder, we believe that every patient needs a lot of counselling so as to get rid of the initial-stage hair pulling habit with a potential to eventually cure the hair pulling disorder. If needed, internal supplements are given to support trichotillomania hair regrowth.

Our basic approach towards trichotillomania cure includes the following:

A detailed case history gives a fair understanding of the stress levels. All important information is extracted to work out a personal plan on how to stop trichotillomania at an individual level.
Clinical examination shows rough patches of hair loss and is an important step to diagnose individual trichotillomania causes and trichotillomania treatment by studying the pattern of pulling hair habit.
The trichotillomania causes and the problem are explained to the patient. If the patient is already aware of the pulling hair habit, he/she is explained what care he/she should take to help curb the habit.
Simple proteins are used to initiate trichotillomania hair regrowth which is also helpful in reducing stress levels and help deal with the hair pulling habit.
Certain precautions are given to the patient which is an integrated part of the trichotillomania cure at Richfeel. An individual’s family is guided on how to support the patient to overcome the trichotillomania causes.