The best hope a patient has of getting what he pays for in a hair transplant is to learn to calculate the number of grafts he needs to cover his balding area. If the surgeon he sees is not in that ballpark, it may be wiser to look for another surgeon. If however, the surgeon estimates a similar number, just make sure all the grafts go onto the balding parts of your scalp. These plugs were both conspicuous and unsightly. They looked quite unnatural; if a person had hair plugs, everyone knew it. They were not only unbecoming, they were also permanent. Improvements were made in hair transplant surgery in the 1980s. Mini-grafts were better, but they still had the appearance of plugs, albeit smaller plugs. First of all, the surgeon must be very skilled in choosing the site of the path where he harvests the donor tissue for the hair transplant. Its width should be no more than one centimeter in most instances. This allows the scalp to close completely when sutured back into place. If the hair transplant procedure is done well, the scar will not be noticeable even if the patient likes to wear his hair in a short style. Some examples of financing options are credit cards, finance companies, and bank loans. Some finance companies are geared especially to people who are getting cosmetic surgery. They may offer loans with no proof of income, available within a day or two of the application. You can finance your entire hair transplant operation with no down payment. However, there are other surgeries that can be used in conjunction with hair transplant to achieve similar results. The difference is that these procedures are generally more painful. 6. The grafts may not survive. Few surgeons will divulge to you the fact that hair grafts do not always survive after hair transplant surgery. It may take special post-operative care and longer down-time. Ask your doctor if she expects you to have more than one surgery session. You may need to have the plugs removed in one session and allow that to heal before going on to the next phase. Your doctor may not know the answer to this until after she sees how your first surgery has gone.