NYDailyNews

New Hope for Hairless: Take a Pill

By BOB KAPPSTATTER Daily News Express

ope is sprouting for millions of follicle-challenged men with news that scientists have developed a revolutionary new treatment for baldness.

Early trials of the drug dutasteride, administered in tablet form, have shown dramatic success in restoring hair.

Successful trials have caused feverish excitement on the Internet, the London Observer reported today, with chat rooms filled with demands for details.

The company behind dutasteride — GlaxoSmithKline — has cautioned that, although work so far was "encouraging," trials have yet to be completed.

The drug works by interfering with enzymes that break down the male hormone, testosterone, and turn it into dehydrotestosterone, a hormone crucial to development of the male foetus, but in later life can cause hair to thin very dramatically.

Original Publication Date: 6/11/01

-- Anonymous, June 11, 2001