The booming business of hair loss

Delivery Strategies of siRNA Therapeutics for Hair Loss Therapy

Therapeutic needs for hair loss are intended to find small interfering ribonucleic acid (siRNA) therapeutics for breakthrough. Since naked siRNA is restricted to meet a druggable target in clinic,, delivery systems are indispensable to overcome intrinsic and pathophysiological barriers, enhancing targetability and persistency to ensure safety, efficacy, and effectiveness. Diverse carriers repurposed from small molecules to siRNA can be systematically or locally employed in hair loss therapy, followed by the adoption of new compositions associated with structural and environmental modification. The siRNA delivery systems have been extensively studied via conjugation or nanoparticle formulation to improve their fate in vitro and in vivo. In this review, we introduce clinically tunable siRNA delivery systems for hair loss based on design principles, after analyzing clinical trials in hair loss and currently approved siRNA therapeutics. We further discuss a strategic research framework for optimized siRNA delivery in hair loss from the scientific perspective of clinical translation.

Increased Interest in Oral Minoxidil for Hair Loss Treatment Following Publication of August 2022 New York Times Article: A Google Trends Analysis

Introduction

Androgenetic alopecia (AGA) is the most common form of hair loss, with negative impact on patient quality of life. Oral minoxidil is used off-label for AGA treatment. We hypothesized increased public interest in oral minoxidil for hair loss treatment following the New York Times (NYT) Article on oral minoxidil: "An Old Medicine Grows New Hair for Pennies a Day, Doctors Say." The objective of this study was to quantify interest in oral minoxidil for hair loss treatment before and after the NYT article and help inform dermatologists about treatments of interest to their patients.

Method

We performed a cross-sectional analysis of Google Trends evaluating relative prevalence of "oral minoxidil," "minoxidil," "hair loss," and "Rogaine®" 2/2022-5/2023. t tests compared mean search volume and linear regression analysis quantified changes in public interest over time.

Results

Oral minoxidil and minoxidil search volumes increased from 0.86 to 3.00 and 22.43 to 32.60, respectively, before and after the NYT article (both p < 0.05). Minoxidil searches continually increased by 500,000 searches per month (p < 0.001).

Conclusions

There was a significant and sustained increase in Google searches for oral minoxidil after publication of the NYT article, indicating increased patient interest. Larger clinical trials are needed to provide evidence-based care to AGA patients.