Table 3.
Signs/symptoms and physical impacts of AA
| Concept | Patients with experience of concept, n (%) (N = 45) |
Example quote(s) |
|---|---|---|
| Hair loss | 45 (100) | |
| Scalp | 45 (100) | − “It started off as spots. Then the spots grew bigger and bigger, and at times it regrows a bit. And, again, it’s kind of an episode. You won’t lose hair all the time, but, when you do lose hair, it’s kind of drastic to see.” (35-M) |
| Eyebrows | 38 (84) | − “They’re pretty sparse. There’s probably like maybe five [hairs] in each eyebrow.” (19-F) |
| Eyelashes | 32 (71) | − “It started on one eye and just kind of progressively like went down the lid, falling out. The other one started falling and eventually all the eyelashes were gone.” (11-M) |
| Nasal hair | 14 (31) | − “I lost the hair in my nose as well, so, yes, again, you don’t get the protection again there.” (25-F) |
| Male facial hair | 11 (58a) | − “I had a full beard, literally. A full beard and it’s all gone.” (26-M) |
| Body hair | 36 (80) | − “I’ve lost all the hair on my arms and on my legs. Started losing the hair underneath my, on my armpit region.” (08-M) |
| Full body | 28 (62) | − “Well, I have no hair anywhere at all. So it’s affected from my head to my legs, my under arms, private areas, everywhere.” (41-F) |
| Nail signs/ symptoms | 14 (31) | |
| Pitted/ Rough/ Brittle/ Split | 14 (31) | − “They’re very weak and they’re bumpy so when I apply nail polish there’s like ridges, waves. It’s just superficial but I like to have my nails look nice.” (06-F) |
| Nail pain | 2 (4) | − “Since the nail is not attached all the way […] if I were to whack it, be clumsy or whatever, I’d be in pain for days.” (24-F) |
| Scalp skin signs/ symptoms | 12 (27) | |
| Itching/ Numbing/ Tingling | 10 (22) |
− “When hair was growing it was very itchy.” (29-F) − “I kind of feel like a light, numbing feel. There’s a difference in the texture of the way my skin feels when it gets touched or rubbed or hit. So I actually do feel the difference. If I were to, say, touch my arm, I can feel that more than my scalp.” (01-M) |
| Burning/ Inflammation | 4 (9) | − “Sometimes I get red bumps and a lot of times the area, it will get red and hot, you can feel it before the hair starts to come out.” (18-F) |
| Dry, flaky skin | 4 (9) | − “I noticed it was very dry and flaky.” (05-F) |
| Oily | 1 (2) | − “I guess the hair soaked up usually sometimes the oils, natural oils.” (07-M) |
| Eye irritation | 22 (49) | − “When I started losing my eyelashes and they’ve kind of come and gone, I noticed me eyes are much more irritated now. Like in the last couple of years, my eyes will get red, they burn, I feel like there’s stuff in my eyes.” (08-M) |
| Nasal irritation | 8 (18) | |
| Inhalation of debris | 3 (7) | − “I breathe in more than your average person that has hair. I guess it’s like a filter. I notice a big difference. I got to blow my nose out every night. I got to shower at least 20 min in steam to get it all out.” (01-M) |
| Nasal dripping | 3 (7) | − “I feel like I have constant nasal drippage, and it’s disgusting […] It’ll just like start, liquid will start pouring out.” (27-F) |
| Sneezing | 2 (4) | − “When I sneeze I do it either five or six times in a row […] I didn’t have that when I had nose hairs.” (07-M) |
| Poor thermoregulation | 3 (7) | − “During sleep, during waking hours, from the cold weather to the hot weather, you can’t regulate your body temperature.” (24-F) |
| Sunburn | 3 (7) | − “Your hair gets really thin so sun passes through it. So I would get sunburns on my scalp very easily, I would feel my head burning.” (10-F) |
aCalculated as a percentage of male patients (N = 19)