Lupus causes fatigue, a facial rash shaped like a butterfly, joint stiffness and joint pain. Besides, some individuals with this autoimmune disease experience loss of hair. Although losing hair can be disturbing, you can handle this condition in many ways.
Why Lupus Causes Hair Loss
Every person who has lupus experiences loss of hair, but many notice gradual breakage or thinning along the hairline. Occasionally, the hair does not grow back, but other times it does. There are various causes for such hair loss, including the following.
Inflammation
As per research, non-scarring hair loss and scarring hair loss are involved in this condition. The former occurs due to inflammation, one of the lupus symptoms. When inflammation develops around your scalp and follicle, loss of hair can happen.
Lupus-induced swelling affects not just the hair on your scalp, but it can lead to loss of beards, eyelashes, and eyebrows as well.
Hair loss that occurs because of swelling is reversible provided that you can successfully treat the disease and you enter remission.
Medication
Your lupus medications can also have side effects, including hair loss. The doctor may prescribe you to purchase an immunosuppressant. This drug works by suppressing the immune system, thereby helping the patient achieve remission.
Which Are the Hair Loss Symptoms?
When lupus affects the hair, there will be more shedding of the hair. As per the AAD (American Academy of Dermatology), shedding a maximum of 100 hairs daily is a normal phenomenon. However, those who have lupus could just lose much more hair than that depending on how severe their illness is. Loss of hair may be apparent when they brush or wash their hair. Some may have just breakage around the hairline or slight thinning, but hair may fall out in clumps in other people. Loss of hair can be limited to one section of your head or widespread.
A study looked at non-scarring type hair loss found in some women with lupus, and it found that they had varying degrees of hair loss. They lost from 55% to 100% of the hair. There needs to be a bigger study to find trends in a more accurate way.
Consult your doctor when you experience hair thinning or loss of any kind. Occasionally, loss of hair is among the signs of lupus.
