There are a variety of ways that cancer or the treatment of cancer can affect your hair and may result in some degree of hair loss. Like most hair loss that accompanies a disease or drug usage, the hair loss should only last as long as the cause of the loss.
There is a rare type of hair loss that occurs when a cancer spreads from somewhere else in the body to the scalp. It is called neoplasic alopecia because the word neoplasic comes from the word ‘neoplasm’, which means tumor, but it may also go by the name metastatic alopecia because the word metastatic comes from the word metastasis, which refers to the spread of cancer.
The susceptibility of the scalp to neoplasic alopecia is higher for women with breast cancer and for men with lung cancer in particular, as opposed to other types of cancer. It is believed that mucines, a certain kind of protein created by breast and lung carcinoma, degenerate the cells of the outer root sheath of the hair follicle. There are cases, however, of cancer spreading from the breast to the scalp without any evidence of hair loss.
Ovarian and adrenal tumors are also likely to cause hair loss. Both types of tumors can cause hyperandrogenism, which is the excessive production of androgens (male hormones). Androgens are known to play a key role in male and female pattern baldness. Once the tumor has been removed, however, the hair loss should go away.
Finally, all cancer-fighting drugs attack the body in order to destroy the cancer cells. This means that any cancer-fighting drug, like chemotherapy, will also attack the body’s hair follicles and cause them to fall out and result in considerable hair loss. Fortunately, when the treatment ends, so should the hair loss.