Adolescent girl suffered from bald spot, mental health affected, eventually regained hair and fitness
English
Everyone loves to be pretty. This adolescent girl was in her prime age but had several round bald spots on the top of her head, which affected her appearance. She felt annoyed and depressed every day. She came to my clinic in 2004 to seek medical treatment when she was 17 years old. In fact, bald spot, commonly known as “a ghost’s shave”, refers to the sudden onset of patchy alopecia. The scalp with the lesion is normal without inflammation. The onset is so sudden that multiple patches of hair can suddenly fall off overnight. The disease is related to insufficient qi and blood as well as deficient liver and kidneys, coupled with a weak heart, which cannot supply enough blood to the brain. Hair is the surplus of blood and the heart dominates the growth of hair. With insufficient qi, blood production will be difficult, causing large patches of hair loss as hair follicles lack nourishment from blood.
When I saw the patient for the first time, her face was pale with dark circles under her eyes. Her palms were sweaty, indicating kidney deficiency and heart weakness. She said her menstruation was irregular, which sometimes came a month late. When it happened, she had abdominal distension, menstrual pain and slight feeling of the breasts swelling. Before the discharge of menstrual blood, dark brown blood clots would be discharged. She also had nasal allergy and she often sneezed, which also indicated weak heart and lungs. In addition, she had constipation with defecation every two or three days. I analyzed her symptoms as deficiency in both her qi and blood. Her five major organs (heart, liver, spleen, lungs and kidneys) were also weak, especially her heart. With long-term insufficient blood supply to her brain, her scalp was also lack of blood, causing large patches of hair follicles to fall off. She remembered she fell and injured the left side of her head when she was a child. There should be accumulation of blood stasis from that fall, causing multiple blockages in the meridians and blood vessels in her brain cells. Insufficient blood supply to her brain led to estrogen secretion disorder by the medulla oblongata in her brain, resulting in irregular menstruation.
After taking the medicine, the patient felt hot, and her hands and feet were warm. At the first follow-up visit, her complexion appeared ruddy, which even her friends agreed, indicating her blood had reached her head and nourished the roots of her hair. Her defecation improved significantly to once a day and it became very smooth. She used to urinate frequently, but now she went to toilet less with urination becoming abundant and strong. Her nasal allergy had also improved a lot with runny nose and sneezing greatly reduced. Short hair roots could be seen growing in the areas of bald spots. She had itchy eczema in her inner elbows, indicating liver detoxification. Among the urine samples she brought in, two bottles were dark orange-brown, proving there was a lot of stasis in her head which had been dissolved by the medicine and discharged along with her urine.
Purple urine indicated stagnated blood in liver
A week later, her inner elbows were no longer itchy and her body often sweated. The areas of bald spots began to feel prickly with the growth of short hair. After taking the second prescription of medicine, she had occasional nosebleeds which lasted for a long time. I thought her nosebleeds were related to the accumulation of stasis in her head. After the stasis was dissolved by the medicine, if the amount was too much, it would be discharged directly through the nasal cavity, which looked like ordinary nosebleeds. At the fifth follow-up visit, 80% of the urine brought in by the patient was purple red, indicating direct excretion of stagnant blood and dead liver cells from her liver. There was some cholesterol in her urine. Based on urine observation, it was shown that there were liver problems, which was also one of the reasons for her irregular menstruation. Women are blood-based and the liver is the bank for blood. If a woman’s liver function is damaged, insufficient blood will result in wrinkles, yellow complexion, liver spots on the face, dizziness, vertigo, windward tears and palpitation. In addition, numbness of the limbs, reduced menstrual flow and even amenorrhea are all symptoms of insufficient liver blood. Therefore, there is a saying that “liver is innate for women”, meaning that the liver is particularly important for women.
Her nasal allergy, which had improved a lot, suddenly recurred, with constant runny nose which caused cough and sore throat. The bald areas had only vellus hair with no further hair growth yet. I suggested the application of ginger and brandy to hair loss areas to help stimulate the growth of hair follicles.
At the seventh follow-up visit, the patient said her menstruation lasted for six days in the previous week. On the first day, less blood clots were discharged than before and her defecation was unsmooth. Her left popliteal fossa had itchy eczema and her runny nose had reduced a lot. She gained two pounds and there was no notable change in her height. At the eighth follow-up visit, the patient had nosebleed once the few days before. It started with a very viscous clot of blood stasis, followed by fresh blood. I thought this should be the direct discharge of brain stasis, which was dissolved by the medicine that had reached her head, from her nasal cavity. The patient also said that she often sweated a lot and she smelled a very stinky rusty smell in her head. I said this was a good sign with blood stasis turning into sweat and directly excreted from her body.
The patient finally developed pseudo fever syndrome for the first time, with diarrhea, vomiting and a mild fever. She made her own decision that day to not continue with taking the medicine, so it took two days to improve. In fact, if she had continued taking the medicine, she should have recovered in one day. The urine she brought in was mostly purple. At the eleventh follow-up visit, her menstruation happened five days late. During the period, there was a slight pain in her abdomen, her breasts were not enlarged and there were only few blood clots. On the first day of menstruation, it was mostly fresh blood. Not until the second day, blood clots appeared, after which there was all fresh blood and she felt a little tired, indicating her liver and kidneys had improved a lot and that her uterus could remain warm.
Defecation unsmooth and body itchy
The condition of her defecation was very peculiar. It was sometimes smooth but sometimes it would be constipated for few days before she could defecate. The patient said if she had no defecation, her body felt itchy, but after defecation, the itching disappeared quickly. At the 16th follow-up visit, the patient accidentally fell and hurt her coccyx when she played long jump at school, causing a dull pain in her coccyx. The patient said she had injured that area before, which took a long time to recover. This time, because of the Chinese medicine, she recovered very quickly with no more pain.
At the nineteenth follow-up visit, the patient was in a cheerful and happy mood. Her complexion was good, her palms were soft and warm, her heart and pulse became stronger and her stomach ache that appeared in the previous two weeks disappeared. The urine she brought in was still purple red, but there were no more liver cell sediments. The colour of the urine she discharged on that day was the lightest ever, indicating her conditions had progressed well with less blood stagnation in her liver. The urine of healthy people should remain light yellow. I was very happy for this.
By the twenty-third follow-up visit, the patient had the smoothest menstruation that month without abdominal distension, pain, headache and other symptoms. The patient said the menstrual flowed like urination without any abnormality. However, she vomited twice, once at night and the other time in the middle of the night. She vomited phlegm in the vomitus and she had a cold and fever, but everything returned to normal the next day. This was what I called pseudo fever syndrome, which happened when the medicine brought out necrotic cells and toxins from her liver which passed through her cerebral blood vessels and stimulated her central nervous system. Like food poisoning, it caused vomiting and diarrhea. Her urine during this period was still purple-red and the amount was very small.
Hair gradually grew around the patient’s bald areas, some was about an inch long, and the situation was very good. The bald areas were gradually shrinking. I believed a few months later, new hair would grow back and the situation would restore normal. Since she hadn’t developed nasal allergy for a long time, I asked her to look for the source of the allergy by trying to eat one type of fruit at a time to find out which fruit caused her allergy.
At the thirty-fifth follow-up visit, the patient’s menstruation ended a few days ago and everything was fine. During the period, she had a cold and cough, which improved after taking cold medicine with only occasional itchy throat. Her fingernails were gradually hardening and growing fast, indicating her kidney had been strengthened as kidneys dominates bones and nails are the surplus of bones.
Up till then, the patient had been treated for nine months with steady recovery. At the thirty-nineth follow-up visit, the patient said she exercised and sweated a lot the previous week. She felt comfortable, only feeling a little tired in her arms, which might be over-exercised. Her hair grew very well with increasing volume. One bottle of urine she brought in this time was purple-red with a hint of black, while the other three were dark brown.
Still a lot of toxins in her body
The patient’s liver continued to excrete a lot of toxins. At the forty-first follow-up visit, the urine brought in was very unusual. One bottle was dark blackish green with black sediments, the same colour as the urine of liver cancer patients, indicating a lot of toxins remaining in her liver. At the 44th follow-up visit, she had pain in her back and left hand as she typed on the computer for too long for her homework the previous week. I massaged the acupuncture points in her hand. The pain disappeared quickly and she also restored energy. The bald areas were completely covered by new hair. Compared with other parts, the hair was not thick enough, but in general, her alopecia areata could be considered cured. More hair would grow in the future, eventually reaching a volume no different from normality.
Later, her inner elbow became itchy again, which didn’t get better even after two weeks. For two times, I saw a lot of necrotic cells and toxins discharged from her liver in her urine, so I believed it was related to toxins in her liver. At the forty-nineth follow-up visit, the rashes on her inner elbow disappeared and there was no itchiness anymore. At the fifty-first follow-up visit, the patient was very tired that she almost fell asleep during the visit. I asked her for the reason and she said she had been very busy with her homework. Her health had been poor and now she slept very late. It was no wonder her physical development was slow that she was short and slender with small breasts. I advised her to build a habit of going to bed early so that she could grow stronger.
The patient might have exercised and sweated a lot that she lost three pounds, but she was energetic. Based on observation of the colour of her urine, she should be able to stop medication two weeks later. The sixty-fourth follow-up visit was her last one. No bald spots could be found anymore and there was very little hair loss. Her skin was no longer itchy. Her defecation was smooth, meaning toxins could be continuously excreted with less accumulation in her liver. The pain in her heels and calves had greatly reduced, indicating her kidney function had been strengthened. Her sclerotin was good. There was no more nasal allergy with her runny nose and sneezing completely disappeared, indicating her heart and lungs had been strengthened. Her menstruation was regular with few blood clots and occasional discomfort in her lower abdomen. There was no menstrual pain and the flow was like urination, which was the best state of menstruation for women. In addition to the complete recovery of alopecia areata, her major organs had also greatly improved.
The patient was first diagnosed on 28 July 2004 and the treatment ended on 1 November 2005, spanning a total of one year and three months with 64 visits.
This article was written by Dr. Sik-Kee Au
September 26, 2017
For enquiries, please email to sikkeeau@gmail.com
Medical case number: 040728