The biggest conference of Hair Transplant in the world, the 24th WORLD CONGRESS ISHRS 2016 was held in one of the most happening places on the Earth, the LAS VEGAS….known for……“Whatever happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.” The meeting was held from Sept 28-October 1, 2016.

It was a three day conference preceded by a day full of pre – conference workshops.
One of these workshops was on Powered FUE technique by the dull punch. The workshop director was the author himself. It was a three hours course ( equally divided into didactic lectures and hands on training on models). Along with him, there were very experienced teachers, Dr. Scott Boden& Dr. Marc Bishara from USA. The workshop was a three hours course, one in the morning and the other one in the evening. Both were sold out.

The workshop started with welcome by the director followed by his technique of FUE. He highlighted the important steps of extraction and especially the Alignment, Engagement and advancement which make it possible to harvest graft at a high speed with virtually very less trauma. He also highlighted other steps of the surgery due to which their patients’ get good results.

Apart from this, he also delivered a lecture on the role of ergonomics in improving the results of FUE. He highlighted how the use of proper instrumentation, magnification, operating lights, operating chair play a role in making it possible for the team to deliver a good result.

Dr. Aman Dua, the other surgeon from AK Clinics, was also a faculty for the Basics course held for the Beginners learning hair transplant. She spoke on the topic of Basics of FUE and then led a table on the hands on practice on FUE

On the first day of the congress, the author participated in a very important panel discussion on FUE delegation. The panel unanimously agreed upon the fact that the part which involves incisions in the FUE Hair transplant ( extraction and slit making) should be done by the surgeons only and not the technicians as is being done in so many parts of the world, especially Turkey and India. The author highlighted that how shadow surgeries are being carried out in every nook and corner and how it has impacted the patient safety especially the devastating effects on the scalp donor areas.

Dr. Aman Dua was also a Table leader in the coffee with experts session in which she shared her experience on the unique aspects of Hair transplant in Indian patients.

The author also participated in three more meetings apart from the General session. Firstly, the FUE Research Committee, in which the author shared that their study

“Comparison of Out of Body time of grafts and Results in FUE” has received the ISHRS Research grant and also the IRB approval. Ten clinics from all over the world (including USA, Greece, Pakistan, Philippines, India) will participate in the study. If any patient wants to participate in that study, he can contact the author for the same.

Then was the Global Council Meeting of the ISHRS of which the AHRS India
(Association of Hair restoration Surgeons of India) is a part and the author being the President represented India. Again the members raised the issue of how patients are being lured by fake advertisements by different hair transplant device companies and how it is causing detrimental effects in the patients’ lives in the long term.

The third was the meeting of the Board of Governors of Asian Association of Hair Restoration Surgeons meeting in which the broad outline of the next years’ scientific meeting was discussed.

Dr. Kapil Dua also presented a poster on …Challenges of Facial hair transplant and Limitations of Body hair transplant while Dr. Aman Dua presented on PRP – the frugal way.

The highlight of the congress on the personal level was the unanimous election of the author as the Board of Governor to the ISHRS. He is the first Indian to be elected to the highest office in the biggest hair transplant organization in the world.