Found: Easy tweaks to prevent hair loss

Summer sun and heat can cause hair to thin and fall out, but research reveals simple strategies that will keep your locks healthy

- KRISTINA MASTROCOLA

Feel like you have more hair in your brush than on your head? You’re not alone! “Thinning hair is common —in fact, we have half the amount of hair at age 40 than we did at 20,” largely due to a drop in estrogen levels, says dermatologist Debra Jaliman, M.D., an assistant clinical professor of dermatology at the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine in New York City. And summer isn’t exactly our hair’s best friend: A study in The British Journal of Dermatology shows that hair loss increases by 6% per day in the summer. Blame everything from damaging UV light to excessive sweating. That’s not all: “More hair often enters dormancy, a period of slowed growth, in the summer, but you may not notice it fall out until early autumn,” says Natalie Kash, M.D., a hair restoration surgeon at the Root Hair Institute in Washington.