Beard hair

Wool fibers are hair that is covered with tiny, lustrous scales. Oils are secreted along the hairs from glands adjacent to the hair follicles. These oils travel up the hair shaft and give the fleece its natural waterproofing. In sheep, this wool grease is lanolin. Wool hairs are soft, wavy and flexible (Table 6.4). Beard hairs are longer, more flexible, and are found only in the outside coat. 

Sheep s wool fibers are classified by their diameter fine (17-23 pm), medium (23-33pm), coarse (33-42 pm), and mixed carpet wool (20-50pm). Luster wool is mosdy beard hairs with a medulla, and scales that are close to the stem. 

Further evidence that sweat plays a role in the incorporation of drugs into hair may be gained from the time of administration and appearance of drugs in the hair. Cone and Piischel et al. separately reported that codeine could be detected in beard hair 24 h after administration. A 5- to 7-d period would be necessary before the beard hair, which was forming during the period of maximum blood levels of the codeine, emerged above the skin. Cone suggested that codeine secretion in sweat and its incorporation into hair could account for its initial appearance in the beard hair. 

The GC/MS procedures for methamphetamine are described in Table 4. The papers published in Japanese - have corresponding reports in English. - - Methamphetamine was detected and determined by mass fragmentography in rat hair after administration of the substance. Nine methods also detected the metabolite amphetamine or amphetamine alone. Suzuki et al. determined methamphetamine also in nail, sweat and saliva. The workup (EX after acid or alkaline hydrolysis) and derivatization technique (methanol-trifluoroacetic acid [TEA]) is rather uniform in most procedures. Nakahara et al. ° used methoxyphenamine excretion into beard hair to discuss several washing procedures. Alkaline or methanolic extraction are used with one exception. Derivatization is mainly made by fluorinated anhydrides. A review ° gives details on analytical procedures, incorporation rates of amphetamines from blood to hair, and relationship between drug history and drug distribution in hair. 

In further studies by Piischel et al., codeine was administered to drug-free volunteers. Beard hair samples were collected and assayed by Abuscreen RIA. Codeine was detected within 24 h of drug administration and was present for a period of 6 to 8 d. Cone also studied the time course of appearance of morphine and codeine in beard hair following single dose administration of morphine and codeine in two human subjects. Data were obtained with the DPC morphine-specific RIA and GC/MS. Morphine and codeine appeared in beard hair about 7 to 8 d after... 

In a study performed by Carpenter et al. designed to evaluate whether or not poppy seed consumption produces morphine-positive hair test results, five subjects consumed between 25 to 35 g of poppy seed containing approximately 112 pg/g of morphine and 11 pg/g of codeine. Samples were collected as follows all consecutive urine samples for 4 d sequential 3-d cumulative beard hair samples beginning prior to consumption of poppy seeds through 15 d and head hair samples begiiming prior to consumption of poppy seeds through 30 d. Urine samples were screened by Emit. Urine samples, beard hair, and head hair samples were extracted by SPE and assayed by GC/MS for 6-AM, morphine, and codeine. Emit results for urine were positive up... 

Subjects given 250 mg/d methoxyphenami ne for 8 d Drug levels measured daily in beard hair... 

Kintz, R, Tracqui, A., Mangin, R, Pharmacological studies on meprobamate incorporation in human beard hair, Int. J. Leg. Med. 105, 283-287,1993. 

Beard hairs have the slowest growth rate (approximately 0.27 mm/d) and a long growth/rest cycle duration of 14-22 months/9-12 months. Beard hairs are exposed to sweat and sebum secretions, the latter being, on the contrary to scalp hairs, excreted through a duct that opens directly onto the surface of the skin. Like scalp hair, beard hair may be subject to environmental contamination and/or cosmetic treatments. In addition, when beard hair samples are obtained by shaving, they are likely to be contaminated by pieces of epidermis. Like scalp hair, beard hair follicles are of the male sexual type. 

As for the relationship between dose and concentration, the same controlled studies, where drug is administered under close supervision, provide results which are strongly suggestive that such a dose-response relationship exists between drug levels in beard hairs and the administered dose. This is not the case in chronic abusers or treated patients, where daily doses vary significantly from day to day so that the establishment of a dose-response relationship would require a large amount of data to attenuate the effects of any bias due to individual differences. 

Hamilton [32] has also shown that eunuchs when injected intramuscularly with testosterone propionate exhibit an increased growth of coarse sternal hairs, and, yet, eunuchs when castrated before age 20 show even less growth of beard hair than eunuchs castrated after age 21 [33] see Table 1-4. 

Table 1. Beard hair castration. growth before and after...

Fig. 5.8. Distributions of different elements in a human hair strand (with root) obtained with the PIXE microbeain technique. The beard hair belonged to the famous astronomer Tycho Brahe (1546-1601), and was retreaved at a tomb opening. Note the uptake of mercury shortly before the death of the bearer [5.14]...

Placebo-controlled studies A placebo-controlled study evaluated the safety and efficacy of topical cidofovir in preventing beard hair growth in healthy men (n = 20) [ll ]. Participants received cidofovir (randomised to either 1% or 3%) and placebo, each applied to one side of the face after shaving (the side allocation was randomised), for either 6 or 8 weeks. There were adverse events reported in 12 subjects the most frequent was upper respiratory tract infection (n=4), and erythema or hyperpigmentation (n = 3), or local pruritus (n = 2). The local skin reactions were all mild and most resolved spontaneously within 8 weeks of the end of treatment. There were no significant changes in blood urea nitrogen or creatinine levels in this small study. 

Wan J, Vittorio CC, Abuabara K, Kurd SK, Mustek A, Steinemann ]M, et al. A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled proof of concept trial of topical cidofovir, 1% and 3%, for the prevention of beard hair growth in men. Arch Dermatol 2012 148(2) 257-9. 

---