•    Helps reduce or prevent hair loss during chemotherapy
•    Supports self-image and emotional wellbeing
•    Offers comfort, dignity, and confidence throughout treatment
•    Safe, non-invasive, and performed under medical supervision
For many, preserving their hair helps them feel more like themselves — maintaining a sense of normalcy in an otherwise challenging time.
 

Scalp cooling can make a meaningful difference, but it does not guarantee complete hair preservation. Some hair shedding is still possible, and results can differ from one person to another. It’s helpful to think of scalp cooling as part of your supportive care — not just a cosmetic option, but a way to protect your emotional wellbeing during treatment.

Scalp cooling works by limiting the damage to hair follicles caused by chemotherapy drugs administered during cancer treatment.

Chemotherapy attacks fast dividing cells in the body. Cancerous tumors are made up of fast dividing cells, but so are hair follicles. Chemotherapy cannot tell the difference between the healthy cells in hair follicles and the unhealthy ones in a tumor. The damage inflicted by these drugs causes hair to fall out around 14 to 21 days after the first treatment.

Vasoconstriction

The cold causes the blood vessels in the patient’s scalp to get smaller. This means less blood flow to the scalp and therefore less chemotherapy drug reaches the hair follicles

Reduced drug uptake into the cells

The chemotherapy drugs need to get into the cell to do the damage, but the cold makes it more difficult for the drugs to enter the cells

Reduced cell division

The cold causes the fast division of the hair follicle cells to slow right down, meaning the chemotherapy doesn’t target these cells, reducing damage

Reduced cell metabolic activity

This is a bit complicated, but put simply, when the cells are cold, all sorts of processes slow down which makes it harder for the chemotherapy to kill the cells in the hair follicle

The scalp cooling system and cap

The scalp cooling system is the size of a small refrigerator and is located in the infusion suite of the hospital or cancer center you will be treated at. The patient doesn’t operate the system, including attaching the cap to the system – this will be done by one of the clinical team.

calculator that will give you an indication of the amount of hair retention you could expect, based on the chemotherapy regimen you will be receiving. If you know your dosage you will get a more accurate indication.

The calculator uses information from the Dutch Scalp Cooling Registry which is a collection of information from over 7000 patients who have scalp cooled. It’s the biggest scalp cooling data set in the world. The information is a true representation of scalp cooling with real patients in real cancer centers, rather than in a clinical trial setting. Access to so much data means that the calculator can give a reliable indication of what you can expect. It is important to remember that the calculator will only provide an indication of what has been experienced by others - you may see more or less hair retention, but it’s a really good starting point.

You will also see that the calculator generates the appropriate post-infusion cooling time for your regimen. There can sometimes be some confusion around these times, but the times generated by the calculator are those that we would recommend to get the best possible outcomes with that particular regimen.