Treatment strategies for alopecia

BACKGROUND: Hair loss is a very common complaint and dermatologists should be able to make the correct diagnosis of different types of alopecia and choose the best therapeutic strategy according to patients' and doctors' expectations. OBJECTIVE: To review treatment of the most common forms of hair loss. METHODS: Literature review and expert opinion. CONCLUSION: There is good evidence based information for the treatment of androgenetic alopecia. There are very few randomized good quality studies and no information about long-term results for most of the available treatments for alopecia areata and cicatricial alopecias. Treatment of alopecia areata and cicatricial alopecias is, therefore, selected in the absence of precise information on the expected outcome and treatment failure is common.