Does Braiding Help Hair Grow Faster?

… Continued …

As well we know, like skin, hair is also elastic – though its elasticity is not as well as skin. But this elasticity is not purposed to make hair get longer because it has its own mechanism to grow.

Too much tension and traction can strengthen a hair shaft, and overtime this eventually may provide a very small impact on the length of hair. But again, such things don’t directly affect the rate of hair growth.

If you do love the health of your hair, braiding or other practices that can cause too much traction & tension on the follicles should be reduced. Overtime, this can cause hair follicle damage which then may cause a serious hair loss problem.

A new study found that tight weaves & breads may have contribution in increasing the risk of developing scarring hair loss that can be irreversible [4].

Many times, tightly curled hair is not easy to manage. This may be the answer of why many women with this type of hair go with hairstyles such as weaves & braids. Even some can turn into extended periods with these hairstyles to reduce the cost.

Unfortunately, the prognosis of hair loss due to this scarring is not too good. Many times, it ends with hair transplant for the treatment.

Even hair transplant also doesn’t always work for all cases. The problem usually comes when the donor sites for hair transplant is not as well as expected or when there is no any donor sites for hair transplant!

This scarring hair loss is more common in African-American women, particularly in those with a history of tight weaves & breads. Typically, this problem begins from the center of the scalp and then spread out.

And unfortunately, many women with this scaring hair loss don’t realize that the hair on their scalp is thinning. The reason is due to they have lots of curl and this may provide a good coverage for areas that are thinning.