Dr. Antonio Alvi Armani

Neoplastic alopecia (hair loss due to the spread of cancer)

There is a rare type of alopecia (meaning hair loss) that occurs when a cancer spreads from somewhere else in the body to the scalp.  It is called ‘neoplastic alopecia’ (from the word neoplasm, which means tumor) or ‘metastatic alopecia’ (from the word metastasis, which refers to the spread of cancer). 

The susceptibility of the scalp to neoplastic alopecia is higher for women with *** cancer and for men with lung cancer in particular, as opposed to other cancers.  It is believed that mucines, a certain kind of protein created by *** and lung carcinoma, degenerates the cells of the outer root sheath of the hair.  There are cases, however, of cancer spreading from the *** to the scalp without any evidence of hair loss.

Neoplastic alopecia is considered to be so closely related to signs of *** cancer, that it is common practice that women over the age of 40 who show signs of alopecia areata (unexplained hair loss) must undergo a *** examination.  In these cases the hair loss could be a sign of carcinoma before the cancer is clinically detected.