First of all, I would like to thank the people behind this forum, I have been following this forum for 2 years now, and it helped me the most making my decision.
I will be writing in English, and I hope the translate feature will make it easy for everyone to understand. And I will include details that I believe will help answer some of your questions.
Turkey has become the world’s capital for hair transplant, but the problem for international patients, is that there is no trustworthy source of information, and the net is full with false marketing and scams, and thus bad reputation. That is why I was very happy when I found this forum, with real patients and unbiased opinions, and very thankful for everyone here.
After researching this forum for more than two years, I contacted many clinics for whatsapp consultations, and the majority said the same thing: that my bald area is too wide, and my donor area could only give 4000 grafts, which can cover the front and middle areas of my head, but not the crown and vertex, and I was ok with that.
My choices were limited to 3 clinics based on their results with cases like mine; and then I finally made my decision to do the surgery with Mr. Sahin for two more reasons (in addition to all the good things everyone knows about him); first reason is that he does the graft harvesting part and the channel opening part by himself for all patients, and that in my opinion gives consistent results. And the second reason is that he was the only clinic in the whole forum that will give me as an international patient the same price as Turkish patient for the surgery itself, they even gave me price in Turkish Lira, and said I can pay with whichever currency I want, which made them much more honest and trustworthy for me. and then offered extra packages for accommodation and transportation that they can provide for a separate price if I want, but I chose to book my own transportation and hotel.
I was in contact with Mr. Ergin on Whatsapp, he was very kind and cooperative and they were kind enough to work on a weekend day for my surgery to fit my travel schedule, so we made an appointment on Saturday 29.5.2021.
I went to their location at 9 am, Mr. Shahin and Mr. Ergin were expecting me; Mr. Shahin checked my donor area, and Mr. Ergin had me sign some paperwork. Then we went to another room where they draw the hair line, took some photos, shaved my hair, and had me dressed for the surgery. And also I made sure to tell them that I knew about them through this forum.
Up to this point all our contact was through sign language and google translate, then a kind lady arrived, a nurse called Mrs. Buket who spoke English fluently and acted also as a translator for us, and were happy to answer all of my questions.
Then we went to the surgery room, they inserted an IV cannula for me and injected an IV antibiotic. Then disinfected my head and Mr. Shahin started the needle-free pressure anesthesia, and what a relief that was, I was very afraid that the anesthesia step would be very painful, especially that they didn’t give me any kind of sedation, but actually it was painless, I barely could feel anything. Then Mr. Shahin assisted by Mrs. Buket started the graft harvesting using 0.8 mm motorized punch. I also was worried that I would be very bored during this process, but because I couldn’t feel anything, I spent most of the time asleep! I think that took around 3 hours.
Then Mr. Shahin did the channel opening, using saphire blade, which also was painless as the previous step, and that took around 1 hour.
Then Mrs. Buket and two other nurses started implanting the grafts into the channels. After a while We had a lunch break, and then they continued. During this process Mr. Shahin and Mr. Ergin were checking on us all the time and making sure everything is ok. When all was done, they gave me the medications and instructions, and I was given an appointment for the first wash on Monday 31.5.2021.
During the whole process Mr. Shahin and his team were very humble, kind, attentive, caring, comforting, smiling, and professional. And that made the whole experience easier and smoother.
Sorry for the long post, I will leave you with some photos now
