I have no clue what is going on. I noticed hair all over Alec's shirt yesterday - like he just went for a hair cut or a cat shed all over him. He said "yeah my hair is falling out a lot". Later that day he showed me how if he tugs gently a few strands just come out. When I helped him comb out his wet hair today there was a bunch in the comb.
I am getting really nervous about this. Does this have to do with Diabetes at all? Is it a side effect of his Lantus or HUmalog? Whats Up?
I emailed his nurse specialist and am waiting for her to get back to me -anyone know anything about this?
Amy - my daughter was dx in June 09 and about a month later I noticed a lot more hair in her hair brush and I still notice it at times. I asked the endo about it and he said it was normal hair loss in the sumemr time (!?). I researched some more and found telogen effluvium, hair loss that occurs after a metabolis stress, similar to the hair loss that occurs after pregnancy. Since our kids were recently dx'd it has to be due to that. It usually stops after 6 months and the hair will grow back. At least I'm hoping so.
Thanks for the info - I think you are correct about the stress/hormone(insulin) being the cause. Alec's nurse got back to me - here is what she said.
Complaint of hair loss isn’t
uncommon soon after diagnosis. There are three things we look at and most
often it is the last of the three. First is thyroid function, because
hair loss can be one of the many symptoms that you would see if the function is
off. Luckily we have already screened his thyroid function and antibodies
and both were fine. The next is Zinc deficiency, which can occur if diet
isn’t up to snuff. We can test a Zinc level if the hair loss
continues for a long period of time. The third and most common is the
post stress effect of diagnosis and initial treatment of diabetes. A colleague
described it as similar to post pregnancy hair loss and the cellular regrowth
rate that occurs after the huge change in the bodies hormone levels (Insulin is
a hormone). This does resolve after a while but it can take several
months. We get more concerned if there are huge clumps of hair, which
would be more indicative of thyroid or Zinc (or alopecia-general hair loss).
I am truly happy it seems to be not such a big deal. I hope you and yours are doing good.
Hmmmmm....I saw the title of the post and jumped to "mom's hair loss". My hair's been falling out in bundles since our son's diagnosis in May. Just one of those "stress and depression" things :)