One of the reasons that the Internet is literally jam-packed with ‘miracle’ hair loss pills, injections, creams and other products is that people with hair loss are usually desperate for a cure.

A lot of hair loss sufferers wish their hair would stop shedding and grow back, so that they can resume their ‘normal’ lives. Opportunistic businesses and individuals seek to capitalise on this by offering hair loss cures, which unfortunately hardly ever work.

The only reliable way to get proper treatment for hair loss is to visit your GP, dermatologist or hair loss specialist (also known as a trichologist), who will recommend or diagnose treatments known to have shown some effectiveness in other patients.

When undergoing any of these treatments, however, it is absolutely vital that you try to maintain realistic expectations on the outcome of the treatment. Hair loss is a very emotional condition, so it can be devastating if you build yourself up to believe you will quickly regain a thick, full head of hair only to see little or no results.

Some hair loss treatments may slow shedding, encourage a little regrowth or slightly improve the appearance of hair. Some may do nothing at all. As far as research has shown, no treatment has yet been developed that will offer a ‘miracle’ cure for hair loss.

One of the most common things women with alopecia areata want to know is when their hair will grow back. Unfortunately, alopecia is an extremely unpredictable disorder. Many factors can combine to cause it, it can start quite suddenly, and the prognosis for each person with the condition will be different.

This rather vague answer can be frustrating for women with alopecia when they hear it from their doctor, but it’s often the only answer available. Doctors can prescribe treatments, and these may even be effective – it’s all about trial and error. Some people may experience hair regrowth after a few months or a year, whilst others may have to wait a lot longer. In some cases, hair may grow back and then fall out again.

It’s hard to accept that you don’t have any control over the disorder or even your own body, but acceptance of what’s happening to you and a healthy dose of positive thinking are some of the only things you can do to cope. Another is to find suitable hair replacement or hair management solutions to help you cover or disguise hair loss until your hair can grow back.

Alternatively, you could shave your remaining hair off and embrace your baldness. It’s all up to you, but you aren’t alone in making your decision. Seek out support groups and other people with alopecia to see how they’ve coped and talk through your concerns.

An auto-immune disorder is one caused by an overactive or excessive response by your body’s immune system to something that is already present in the body. This means that the body mistakes a normal tissue or substance for a pathogen (an infectious agent) and attacks it.

These kinds of diseases can be limited to a particular organ, or it can affect the same tissue in different places of the body. One notable example of this is the hair loss disorder alopecia areata, which can affect hair all over the epidermis (skin).

Although alopecia areata is suspected to have hereditary causes, it is generally considered to be an auto-immune disorder. In people with the condition, the body attacks its own hair follicles, therefore stopping or inhibiting the growth of hair. T-cell lymphocytes are believed to cluster around the affected follicles, which in turn causes inflammation and the loss of hair.

What triggers alopecia?

It is currently thought that a combination of emotional trauma or stress, a pathogen and possibly hereditary factors will trigger the condition. Alopecia areata often starts suddenly, and can be difficult to diagnose due to the many factors that can trigger it.

Women with hair loss generally try anything and everything in the attempt to find a cure for their condition and grow their hair back. However, all the miracle products and revolutionary treatments in the world won’t remedy your hair loss problem if you don’t know what’s causing it in the first place.

This is why the first place to start on the road to hair loss recovery is with a formal diagnosis. Unfortunately, because hair loss can have so many, often complicated causes, this is not always as easy as visiting your family doctor. What your GP can do, however, is some groundwork on your diagnosis, as well as referring you to specialists who can hopefully help you.

Not all female hair loss cases are simple to diagnose, so you need to prepare yourself for a number of medical appointments and plenty of tests. You may need to see dermatologists, trichologists and other specialists before you can pinpoint the exact cause of your hair loss.

Finding the cause of hair loss is so important because it points the way to effective treatment. With the details of your condition in front of them, your doctor or specialist should be able to tell you exactly what to do next.

Losing your hair can make a massive dent in your self-confidence, as well as completely changing your perception of how you look. This can negatively affect your life if you let it.

To boost your confidence and self-esteem, and feel good about yourself again, try these helpful tips:

• Accept yourself and what you look like, as well as what’s happening to your hair. You can’t change it right now, so there’s no point making yourself miserable and wishing the problem would go away

• Stop comparing yourself to other people – even when you have hair, this will never do your self-esteem any good

• Remember: true beauty comes from who you are as a person. It doesn’t matter what physical changes you go through, you will always be you

• Try not to worry what other people think of you and what you look like – it is your own opinion that matters

• Take back control of what is happening to you, by researching your hair loss condition and getting a formal diagnosis from a trichologist (a hair loss specialist)

• If you need an extra confidence boost, consider human hair wigs or other, more advanced hair replacement solutions.

A number of female hair loss conditions are caused by emotional or physiological trauma, stress or hormonal changes in the body. This is why it is important to learn ways to beat stress, to avoid conditions such as alopecia areata and telogen effluvium which can cause considerable hair loss.

The following are a few useful tips to help you avoid or cope with stress:

1. Find out what stress really is. The sooner you are able to understand stress and its effects on the body, the better you will be able to recognise the signs and take positive action to reduce stress.

2. Sort out work problems. If excessive workload or bullying at work is causing your stress, you need to speak to your boss about it right away. Don’t be afraid to explain how you feel – everyone gets stressed sometimes and your health is more important than any deadline.

3. Talk out your problems with a close friend or someone you can trust. This can make you feel a hundred times better, as you work through what’s bothering you and release some tension.

4. Learn how to relax, and do things that help you to release stress. Some people like to read a book to wind down, whilst others prefer exercise to let off some steam and get an adrenaline boost.