Eamon’s Hair Transplant Journey - Part I: Before Treatment

Coming from a family where hair loss had always been an inevitable part of aging, Eamon knew his full head of hair was doomed. As the years went by and his hair was getting thinner and patchier, he decided to do something to take on his unfortunate genetic legacy.

Irish, 47, Eamon Duffy works as radio presenter and voiceover artist. He is going to share his personal story with us, starting from his struggle with hair loss, why he finally decided to undergo a hair transplant, why he chose Qunomedical.

This is the first episode of a series of interventions Eamon is going to post on our blog. You’ll get to read a first-hand experience of a hair transplant patient before, during, and after his treatment. If you want to learn more about hair transplant surgery, have a look at our Hair Transplant Cost Guide to find out more about pricing, or our Post-op Hair Transplant Guide to get an idea of what results you can expect after surgery.

Eamon will have his treatment done in a week’s time and is now describing his personal story and thoughts before leaving.

We think his own words will best describe the start of his journey.

“My name is Eamon Duffy, I’m 47 years old, Irish, a radio presenter and voiceover artist in the advertising world. And I am losing hair. Like many men my age and younger, I suffer from receding hairline and partial baldness in my crown area, also known as Male Pattern Baldness, or MPB. Let me share with you why I don’t want to let this define me anymore and why I am undergoing a hair transplant surgery in about one week’s time. In a different country.

My background is very common here in Ireland. I’m the youngest of a family of six. I have three older brothers and two older sisters. All of my brothers started to get thin on top and have since gone bald and both my sisters have also suffered with slight thinning of the hair. I had a very thick head of hair all my life.

Being a child of the 80s, as you can imagine, I had every hairstyle out there. I was very proud of my hair and very much liked having so much of it. I remember when I was younger looking at all of my brothers lose their hair in their late 20s to early 30s, this disturbed me greatly. All through my 20s I’d check and see if I was thinning like they did before me and when I found I wasn’t, I was quite happy.

I hit 35 years old and still had a very full head of thick hair, so I was very relieved and thought maybe I was going to be the one in my family that hair loss had skipped. Unfortunately, I was wrong.

At around age 40, I started feeling very cold on the top of my head in winter time and getting my scalp quite badly sunburned in summer. I’d have to apply sunblock or wear a hat on holiday to prevent getting roasted. I had many friends who I’d grown up with that knew I liked my hair and so, like friends sometimes do, they’d tease me about losing it. I remember one day speaking to my barber about it and he told me I was “just at that age”, so I should resign myself that my hair was going and going quickly.

After coming home from a sun holiday in 2015, I saw a photo of myself in a swimming pool and I couldn’t believe how much of my hair had disappeared on the top of my head. Then going into my bank or clothes shops, I’d see the back of my head on CCTVs filming the front door and again I’d cringe at the patch forming rapidly on the back of my head. I decided I wanted to do something about it.

It wasn’t a vanity thing or a confidence issue for me, it was more a realisation that I was progressing in years.

I set about researching various ‘treatments’ and wonder cures. I must have tried everything from shampoos, to tablets, to head massages and even ‘old wives’ tales’ of a foul-smelling potion that you rub on your head to encourage growth, none of which worked for me, in fact I reckon some of those things may have sped up the balding.

I became very disheartened. I started having my hair cut short, applying thickening agents in powder form to beef up the remaining hair giving the illusion of more hair than was really there. When that wasn’t an option anymore, at one point I even turned to the dreaded comb over and would regularly wear baseball caps or beanie hats, the usual stuff men with thinning hair do.

But deep down, I was very annoyed and sad.

It wasn’t a vanity thing or a confidence issue for me, it was more like a realisation that I was progressing in years and it was beginning to show, which is something that I’ve a bit of a problem with. I go to the gym, watch what I eat, wear nice clothes, just generally look after myself, but the hair loss was beyond my control. Or was it?

I remember back in October 2016 I began looking into hair transplants. What I quickly found out was, they’re expensive. A few hours later I was on Facebook and came across a sponsored post about hair transplants abroad by a company called Qunomedical. Their offer was around 80% cheaper than in Ireland (a big shout- out to targeted advertising at this point!). I thought, “Why not?”, so I filled in the online form, sent it off and thought no more. Less than 24 hours later, I got a phone call from a gentleman called Shaz who told me he was calling from Qunomedical.

We spoke at great and I mean great, length and discussed what they could offer me, their services, their clinics in the various countries, my options etc. I think I must have asked him about 200 questions, most of which he answered there and then, but the ones that he couldn’t answer because of them being of a medical nature and personal to me, he wrote down and came back to me in a day or so. He requested I take some photos of my head and send them to him so he could have them appraised to make sure not only had I enough donor hair, but also that the clinic could take on with my transplant.

I was very impressed with how efficient and honest Shaz was at representing his company.

Most of the time he would come back to me with answers to my questions the same day, or at most within 24 hours. This impressed me greatly and made me feel that he was really looking after me as a client and was also very understanding of my situation. I took away a bundle of information from our multiple conversations and made a decision to go ahead with it.

I decided to travel to Poland near Krakow. This was purely a logistics-based decision as it’s only a 2-hour flight from Dublin. The clinic in Poland was very accommodating by getting my procedure scheduled for first thing on a Monday morning so that I would not miss out on too much work being that I’m mostly self-employed.

At the time of writing this post, I’m only a few days away from having my hair transplant surgery done.

I’m very excited about the prospect of having a full head of hair once more, but if I’m very honest, I’m a tad apprehensive of what to expect. Will it be painful? Will it be successful? Will I be happy with the results? All very valid questions I’m sure you’ll agree, but only time will tell.

I know that I’m in good hands with Qunomedical, I have no doubt.

It’s still a waiting game for me right now and possibly for you too if you are reading this. All I can say at this point is that I will be regularly back with updates--including more posts, pictures, and videos.

For now though, thank you very much for reading this and I’ll be back here with an update very soon.”

Eamon Duffy

If Eamon’s story has raised your interest or if you have any questions about hair transplant surgery or any other treatment, contact us!

We are available to answer all your questions and give you a free, personalised quote!

Read More About Eamon's Journey!

Eamon's journey - Part II - During Treatment Eamon's journey - Part III - After Treatment Eamon's journey - Part IV - 3 Months later