Many people feel shocked and anxious at the prospect of loosing their hair as a result of chemotherapy. Some but not all chemotherapy treatments may cause hair loss. Although you cannot prevent hair loss entirely it may be possible to reduce or delay hair loss by using a ‘cold cap’ or ‘scalp cooling’. Scalp cooling is a method used to prevent or reduce the amount of hair loss for patients receiving chemotherapy. Research studies have shown that scalp cooling is often effective across a wide range of chemotherapy drugs.

Scalp cooling lowers the temperature of the scalp, by restricting the amount of blood reaching the hair follicles this protects them from the effects of the chemotherapy drugs carried in the blood stream.

Many patients have found scalp cooling very successful. The success of scalp cooling however, cannot be guaranteed as a number of factors can affect the outcome such as age, hair type and chemotherapy treatment.

Scalp cooling is not suitable for all patients so please discuss this option with your doctor or nurse.