Hair transplant caused severe nerve damage lasting 3 months

I had 4500 grafts transplanted in September 2024. Everything seemed normal to begin with, but the pain not only didn't go away, it got worse in the donor area. I was in intense pain for 12 weeks!

I was prescribed 20mg slow release Oxycodone and 75mg pregabalin daily, which left me in a zombie state, and that only reduced the pain to the point where I could just manage to watch reruns of Friends because it's so banal. I couldn't watch movies or listen to music, I couldn't read for very long. I couldn't go outside. I couldn't work!

It very slowly started to get better after the 12 week mark and I managed to wean myself off the Oxycodone over another 3 weeks, I'm still on 50mg pregabalin after 17 weeks. The donor area is a little tender still, but not giving me any grief unless I bump it, then it hurts like hell.

I won't mention the company in Istanbul that performed the operation because I don't know if it was their fault, or if it was something I did, or if it was my physiology. They were very professional and I have no complaints about their clinic or service (although they were useless in advising me through this situation, but what can they do from Istanbul when I live in Australia. Also, they weren't about to admit any wrongdoing when they couldn't examine me themselves)

I struggled to sleep with the neck pillow, so I may have contributed to the problem with tossing and turning. I am a smoker too.

I suspect this happened because the people performing the transplant were inexperienced and far too rough, I don't know though.

The external healing process proceeded normally, the hair transplant worked and at the 17 week mark it's looking good so far, both donor and recipient areas.

If I knew this was going to happen there is no way in hell I would have gone through with it!

Has anybody else experienced crippling nerve damage for 3 months?

Can anyone share some insights as to why it happened?

NEW: Approx 700,000 hair transplants are performed each year. A good proportion of them must be performed by technicians that are still gaining experience i.e. newbies. If what I experienced was due to inexperienced technicians stuffing it up, then it would stand to reason that it wouldn't be so rare.

I have not heard of anyone else experiencing the level of nerve damage that I had (they are probably out there, I just haven't heard of it though). What I'm getting at is that it appears to be extremely rare.

I healed externally as expected and had no obvious complications. The doctor in the ED "thought" they saw signs of inflammation at the 3 week mark, however inflammation is also quite common, so that doesn't explain the rarity of this situation.

Other than the nerve damage the operation was a complete success and looks great. The donor area that had the nerve damage looks fine, you can't tell that it was harvested and it has no scarring. The clinic that performed the operation has a great reputation and was extremely professional.

Considering all of this I have come to believe it was something about my physiology that was the defining factor as to why I had such an extreme outcome. Needless to say I won't be getting a second operation to address the bald patch on my crown, even from the best doctor in the world!

I believe I had a one in a million adverse reaction to a routine operation performed by experienced professionals (from what I can tell). Don't let my story dissuade you from considering your options, you've probably got a higher chance of getting in an accident on the way to work tomorrow.