Transcript
Announcer:
You’re listening to DermConsult on ReachMD. On this episode, we’ll learn about how the treatment of alopecia has evolved in recent years with Dr. Benjamin Ungar. He’s the Director of both the Alopecia Center of Excellence and the Rosacea and Seborrheic Dermatitis Clinic at the Kimberly and Eric J. Waldman Department of Dermatology at Mount Sinai. He spoke on this topic at the 2026 Maui Derm NP+PA meeting. Here’s Dr. Ungar now.
Dr. Ungar:
The field of hair disorders has evolved quite a bit in the last few years in a number of different ways, and there have been significant advances in the diagnosis and treatment of different kinds of alopecia.
In many respects, the largest advances in the last several years have been in the treatment of severe alopecia areata, where the advent of now three approved oral JAK inhibitors has transformed our ability to treat alopecia areata. Many people have been successfully treated with this class of medications that was not approved even five years ago. It really has made a dramatic impact on people's lives in a way that I think can't be overstated.
In parallel, some of the lessons that we've learned from alopecia areata in terms of understanding the underlying immune processes and thinking about how we can target that in order to produce good clinical outcomes are now being translated to scarring alopecia as well. And so there are no approved treatments so far, but there have been some studies and there are ongoing studies to hopefully identify approaches so that we can ultimately get similar successful treatments available to a large population of patients who currently suffer from scarring alopecia and who have no approved and variably effective treatments available.
There have also been some advances in the non-inflammatory hair-loss space as well. And I think one of the biggest advances is actually the repurposing of an older medication—and increased use in that manner in recent years that even ten years ago was not the case—called low-dose oral minoxidil to treat male and female pattern hair loss and other causes of hair loss as well. Minoxidil is an old medication; it was used decades ago originally. It has been used in the topical form and is FDA approved for that in that formulation for many years, and it's helped a lot of people. But there are certain obstacles and burdens associated with topical minoxidil use that makes it less than ideal in many cases. And low-dose oral minoxidil has shifted a lot of the treatment approaches in recent years and can often be quite effective. And although this is not a new medication, this approach to using low-dose oral minoxidil, I think, has been a game changer in the treatment of hair loss in recent years.
Beyond that, there are at least two encouraging Phase III trials that have been reported with potentially new treatment approaches as well in the pattern hair loss space. One is an extended-release minoxidil formulation, and another one is a topical clascaterone approach. And certainly, we have to see what the final data look like for both of them. But these are potential approaches that can be added to the treatment armamentarium that may help people in the near future as well.
Announcer:
That was Dr. Benjamin Ungar talking about recent treatment advancements for alopecia, which he presented on at the 2026 Maui Derm NP+PA meeting. To access this and other episodes in our series, visit DermConsult on ReachMD.com, where you can Be Part of the Knowledge. Thanks for listening!
