PRP or PRF for Hair Loss? What a 2026 Trial Actually Found

A multicentre randomised clinical trial published in 2026 in the Journal of Dermatological Treatment compared three preparations in 74 patients with female pattern hair loss, across four treatment sessions: platelet-rich plasma, injectable platelet-rich fibrin, and concentrated growth factors.

The reported increases in total-area hair count were: concentrated growth factors, 27.1 percent; injectable PRF, 26.5 percent; PRP, 14.5 percent.

Hair diameter improved across all three arms with no significant difference between them. The injectable PRF arm had the lowest rate of adverse events.

It is one trial. It enrolled women only, roughly twenty-five patients per arm, and the published results do not tell us how long the difference held after treatment ended.

PRP remains the more extensively studied option for pattern hair loss, with multiple systematic reviews and meta-analyses of randomised trials behind it. A single trial, however well conducted, does not overturn that body of work.

The accurate reading is this: early comparative evidence suggests PRF performs at least as well as PRP for pattern hair loss, and this trial found greater hair-count improvement in women. Larger and longer studies are needed before anyone should say more than that.

You will notice that is a narrower claim than you will read almost anywhere else. That is deliberate.

Here is what a study design like this cannot capture, and what we think matters more than the choice between two preparations.

Hair loss is a symptom rather than a diagnosis. Thyroid dysfunction, androgen patterns, iron and ferritin status, vitamin D, insulin resistance, postpartum shifts, rapid weight loss, GLP-1 medications and several common prescriptions all suppress hair growth, frequently more than one at a time.

A trial enrols patients with a defined diagnosis and treats them identically. A clinic does not have that luxury and should not want it. If a patient has an untreated thyroid problem or a ferritin level on the floor, the question of PRP against PRF is close to irrelevant, because either one is working against a headwind that no injection technique overcomes.

This is why the evaluation comes first here. Dr. Anna Frisch is a board-certified endocrinologist with an MD and a PhD, more than 26 years in clinical practice, and more than 40 scientific and medical publications, and the protocol she designed starts with the medical question rather than with the syringe.

Both preparations are made from a small draw of your own blood in our Wellington office and used the same visit. PRP is drawn into a tube containing an anticoagulant and spun at higher force, producing a liquid concentrate that releases its growth factors quickly. PRF is drawn into an additive-free tube, spun at lower force, and clots into a fibrin scaffold that releases growth factors more gradually.

For the scalp we consider the pattern and stage of loss, whether a customised formulation is called for, how the area has responded to previous treatment, and what the evaluation turned up. Your protocol names which preparation is being used and why, so you are not left guessing.

Ask what will be evaluated before anything is injected. Ask who designs the protocol and who delivers the treatment. Ask what happens if you are not responding at three months.

A practice that has good answers to those three questions will serve you better than one that has a strong opinion about PRP against PRF.

Every regenerative protocol at Palm Beach Cosmetic Medicine is designed and supervised by Dr. Anna Frisch, MD, PhD, and delivered by our credentialed care team. Consultations are complimentary.

Neither PRP nor PRF is FDA-approved as a treatment for hair loss. The devices used to prepare them are FDA-cleared as medical devices, which is a different thing. Individual results vary, and PRP is not appropriate for every type of hair loss.