There are a number of different reasons for why a woman may find that she starts to lose her hair. Yet although some women do suffer from hair loss, it is not to the same extent that men do. In this article, we look at one reason that is the cause of female hair loss and is the most common.

Although it has always been considered to be predominantly a male problem, today you will find that some women are just as likely to suffer from serious hair loss as well. In fact, according to the American Academy of Dermatology, it is a problem that now affects around 30 million women in the United States alone.

For quite a few women the reason that they start losing hair is because of their genetics. All women have hormones in their bodies called androgens, but for a few, these can actually interfere with the way that their hair grows normally. The main hormone in this group, which causes such a problem, is testosterone.

Normally this sits in the woman’s body quite happily but unfortunately for some women because of their genetic make up it converts into DHT. Now DHT or Dihydrotestosterone binds to the receptors found deep within your hair follicles and prevents messages from being allowed to access the follicles that tell it to grow. Therefore, this in turn prevents normal growth and regrowth and this is when women will start to notice that they are losing more hair than usual.

Over time, there will be a build up of DHT in the hair follicles, this then will begin to cause them to shrink. This in turn results in the disruption of the natural hair growth patterns and often results in hair loss occurring. This will then result in suffering from female pattern baldness or referred to medically as androgenic alopecia.

Yet even though this form of baldness in women is similar to the version that men get there are some slight differences between them. In most cases for women, it will be very difficult to see because it is diffused and often is a thinning of the hair rather than them losing hair and becoming bald. As for men they will start to see the line of hair begin to thin and then recede altogether. The most common place it occurs on women is on the top of their scalps, as for men it happens at the crown, on the temple, or at the back of the head.

The other main difference between the female version and the male version of pattern baldness is that men usually only start to suffer from it as they grow older. However, for women they can suffer from this kind of hair loss at any stage of their lives. In some cases it may well be that the loss has been caused by some other underlying medical condition that they have.

Along with the reason above, as to what can be the cause of female hair loss in women, there are other factors that may be the cause of this problem. Some women may, as previously mentioned, may have an underlying medical condition. Whilst for others the reason that they have begun to lose their hair is that they have suffered some kind of traumatic event in their lives.