Can Rollers Cause Hair Loss and Thinning?

Can hair rollers be a cause of hair loss and thinning hair? Why are we talking to you about rollers?

Because rollers are a major cause of traction alopecia. What’s traction alopecia? Traction means pulling, alopecia means hair loss, so it means hair loss from pulling. Including rollers. So Velcro rollers, hot rollers, metallic rollers, sponge rollers, or any device that’s pulling on the scalp can cause traction alopecia.

When I do put the rollers in, I have to be very careful to make sure that two things don’t happen. One is putting too much hair in your roller because your hair will not dry and there is too much weight pulling on the follicle. So when you roll up the hair, you want to make sure you don’t have that, you know, that tugging. We all know that feeling of tugging on the follicles when the ponytail is too tight or someone’s pulling your hair.

Now let’s talk about some of the things that can happen with rollers when you don’t follow certain sanitation conditions and make sure the rollers are clean.

First of all, I’m not going to use rollers that anybody else uses. So if I go somewhere and someone’s doing my hair, I have to make sure those rollers have been sanitized. Why? Because you can get a lot of fungus growing on rollers. If they’re wet and put into wet hair that fungus transfers to your scalp.

Fungus and bacteria cause alopecia. Why? Because that follicle is a living thing. If you get fungus and bacteria into the follicle, it’s infected. What happens when something’s infected? It starts to release sebum and all kinds of things to try to clean itself out, and then the hair follicle can be damaged and you can lose hair.

So. Be careful, make sure your rollers are clean. You can get a little tool and just kind of brush all the hair out of the rollers. You want to make sure they’re clean. If you’re the only one using them. That’s great. If there are other people using them with you, you need to clean them every single time. I spray mine down with alcohol, just to make sure that they’re clean. I don’t want to have to worry about any kind of fungus. I’ve never had a problem with it.

Tags: hair loss, hair thinning, hair rollers, alopecia, traction alopecia, healthy hair, causes of hair loss, hair and wellness, hair growth, causes of traction alopecia