Advertisement
Arthritis drug restores 100% of hair on some patients with severe alopecia in global trial
Tests at hospitals in the US, Europe and China discover medication can help to reverse hair loss caused by the autoimmune disease
2-MIN READ2-MIN
3
Listen
For many, losing hair isn’t just a cosmetic worry – it is a deeply personal struggle that can chip away at confidence, social life and mental health. Now, a surprising candidate is offering new hope: a pill originally designed to treat arthritis.
The condition is called alopecia areata. It is an autoimmune disease where the body’s own immune system mistakenly attacks hair follicles, causing unpredictable hair loss. Sometimes it is just a few patches but in severe cases, the entire scalp, eyebrows and even body hair can vanish. Until now, there has been no reliably effective treatment.
Enter upadacitinib. This once-daily oral medication was previously approved to tame inflammation in various forms of arthritis. But scientists suspected it might also help with alopecia areata by calming the same kind of immune overreaction that destroys hair follicles.
To test this, researchers at Harvard University ran two large, international clinical trials across hospitals in North America, Europe and China. They recruited people with severe alopecia areata.
Select Voice
Select Speed
1x
AI-generated voice