Hair Loss - Too Much Zinc?

I am a 61 years old and have always had a full head of hair. Several months ago I noticed the hair on the top of my head was thinning to the point that a lot of my scalp was showing through and believe me, it concerned me a lot. It seemed to be getting worse and worse and I was at a loss on how to stop it.

Over the past several years I have become somewhat of a supplement nut for concerns like heart disease, prostate, joint and sexual health. I began to wonder if some of these supplements were having a negative effect on my hair so started doing a little research on this. Turns out that taking too much zinc, selenium or vitamin A can all lead to hair loss and the item on this list that caught my eye was zinc.

For improved sexual function I had been supplementing with 50mg zinc tablets in addition to the 15mg of zinc that my multi-vitamin gives me. I can’t really say how much improvement in sexual function I ever got from the 50mg tablets, so it wasn’t hard to make the decision to eliminate this from my daily intake to see if I could stop my hair from falling out.

Well, it has been over a month now since cutting out the extra 50mg of zinc and there has been a significant change in my hair loss. Not only has my hair stopped falling out, it has already started growing back in and is significantly thicker then it has been in a long time.

I can only say this has been a huge relief and only wanted to pass on my experience with zinc as I know there are quite a few guys here that supplement zinc with similar amounts and to be on the lookout for thinning hair.

Just in case you were wondering what supplements might be good for your hair, these include Vitamin B complex, Vitamin D, iron and oddly enough Vitamin A which was also on the bad list. I guess that one is a balancing act. I should also mention that men should not supplement iron as we get enough iron from our diets and too much iron has a negative cardiovascular effect among many other problems.

That is very interesting. I worked with a great trainer a few years ago. He is a bit of a “do as I say and don’t question me” type. When we started he asked what supps I was taking. I told him I was taking ZMA. He asked why the hell was I taking that. I said for sexual function and test boost. He said “Ridiculous, waste of money, stop taking it.”

For what it is worth he said all I needed for supps was: quality multivitamin, fish oil, an aspirin a day, CoQ10 and a high quality protein supp.

Would like to say my hair grew back but was bald before I took it and I am still bald!

Thanks for posting this - very interesting list re hair supps.

A year ago I noticed the same as gprent and I am 58, my hair is natural blonde so I started applying and after two month my hair began to grow back . Certainly interesting anecdotal about zinc and I wouldn’t know since not a regular user of zinc only occassional.

What did you apply to make your hair grow back?

Ah sorry mate! Rogaine twice daily for about two months I had kind of itchy scalp and a very thin ares of my top front scalp was getting larger.

sta-kool what is the aspirin a day for?

One of the best supplement for hair is biotin. I had I guess what you would call a deceding hairline my whole life and hated it and always said I wish my hair would fall out there. Well, what seems like overnight a year ago I got my wish. I don’t know what’s been going on with my hair as I’m only 31 and had annoyingly thick hair, but it was really starting to worry me. Taking biotin has helped a lot. The most annoying thing about it is my hair and nails grow a lot quicker. I noticed I needed haircuts a lot sooner and was cutting my nails more than once a week. So hopefully with my hair growing so fast it will also grow thicker or back where it belongs. Haha, hope this helps.

gprent

Interesting point on (probably too much) zinc. Thanks, I will remember it when I’ll plan for supps beside my Ginseng.

sta-kool

Aspirine daily intake? Wow, please care for your stomach, that is some nasty acid and the long-term effects on your stomach are known and dangerous: ulcers and even worse things. That Aspirine thing is a huge marketing blast, but the benefits versus side-effects balance does not speak in favor of Aspirine. Clinically proven, but the pharma industry does not like these studies!

hung21

I can confirm the Biotine effect. My Madame recommended it to her customers as Nail Stylist and it always worked.

This thread has gotten me very curious. I’m fairly young and have been gaining more hair around my groin, if I wanted to thin it out do you think zinc might be a good try? Its either too much or too little I guess.

Too much zinc could cause iron and/or copper deficiency/anemia which in turn causes hair loss among other nasty stuff.

If taken correctly zinc may boost testosterone production and thus increase dihydrotestosterone, for some men DHT weakens the hair follicles until the hair thins and eventually falls and the follicles die but that only affects hair on the top of the head like in male pattern baldness.

As a side note: Aspirin may decrease testosterone levels for some men, just keep in mind that everybody’s reactions are different as there are many factors involved.

No, don’t think it would work.