Taxotere & Permanent Hair Loss
Taxotere, manufactured by Sanofi Aventis, is an alternative chemotherapy drug that has lead to many documented cases of permanent hair loss, known as alopecia.
While breast cancer is the most common cancer treated with Taxotere, it is also used for various other cancers such as prostate, lung, stomach and head/neck cancers.
The Problem with Taxotere
Taxotere was introduced to the market in the 90s as a less expensive alternative to Taxol, another chemotherapy drug. Taxotere was reportedly as effective at cancer treatments, and with similar side effects, including temporary hair loss.
What became very clear however, is that many cancer survivors were not seeing their hair return at all, despite the drug company’s claims that hair loss was temporary. Even though temporary hair loss is a very common side effect of many chemotherapy treatments, permanent hair loss was not a side effect with Taxol.
Additionally, there is strong evidence from multiple studies that points to alopecia being caused in patients who usedTaxotere as a chemotherapy treatment long before the FDA recognized the issue in 2015.