Is Caffeine What Your Hair Needs?

Well, there you are. I thought it was you flitting through cyberspace. Help yourself to a big mug of Arabica beans and chew your way through them along with a virtual treat while I tell you about yet another use for coffee...or at least caffeine.

Healthy hair and regular hair growth relies on a number of factors, including vitamins, minerals, and the presence of other nutrients. Medications, genetics, nutritional deficiencies, and underlying diseases and disorders can all negatively affect your hair. Caffeine, a naturally-occurring compound found in several plants, might have a beneficial effect on your hair follicles to promote healthy hair.

Caffeine has the ability to interact with your hair follicles, helping to guide your follicles' behavior and regulate hair growth. A study published in the "International Journal of Dermatology" in 2007 found that the presence of caffeine stimulated laboratory-cultured hair follicles, increasing hair growth. As a result, caffeine might help to restore hair growth, or prevent abnormal hair loss. However, the clinical effects of caffeine on promoting hair growth have not yet been thoroughly investigated.

Caffeine Absorption

There are several ways to expose your hair follicles to caffeine, to potentially stimulate hair growth. Caffeine consumed via food and beverages enters your bloodstream, and eventually reaches your hair follicles. In addition, your hair follicles can absorb caffeine directly via topical application of caffeine-enriched shampoo, according to a study published in "Skin Pharmacology and Physiology" in 2007. This might allow doctors to expose your hair follicles to a high dose of caffeine, without causing the side effects that can occur due to high-dose caffeine ingestion. As a result, hair products containing caffeine might represent treatments for hair loss, if caffeine eventually develops into a drug therapy for alopecia.

Possible Benefits in Cancer Therapy

Preliminary studies have identified caffeine as a possible treatment for hair loss, which might have implications in the treatment of other diseases. Many cancer patients receiving radiation therapy suffer hair loss, due to damage to the hair follicles by the radiation. A study published in the "Journal of Radiological Protection" in 2002 found that treating laboratory mice with caffeine helped reduce hair loss following radiation treatment. Although further research into the effect of caffeine on radiation therapy-induced hair loss in humans requires further investigation, caffeine might eventually help prevent hair loss due to some cancer therapies.

 
Recipe for Caffeine shampoo
Mix 4 teaspoons of caffeine powder in eight ounces of shampoo and suds up as usual. You can also mix the caffeine powder in a spray bottle with eight ounces of water, and spritz it on 10-15 minutes before showering.

You can use this treatment each time you shampoo, but don't use it more than once a day.  

Tip: If you start experiencing headaches, you're using too much spritz or shampoo. Stop for a few days (or up to a week), then try again using 2-3 teaspoons of caffeine powder instead.

Caffeine powder is available at most health and wellness stores, several retail stores, and at many shops online, including Amazon.

Nah...think I’ll just drink mine – minus the shampoo, of course.

See ya, eh!

Bob