5 Hair Care Best Practices for Preventing Hair Loss and Promoting Hair Growth

If you regularly wash your hair, style it with products or brush, you could potentially be damaging your hair or even hindering it's ability to grow. But with some advice you could make some minor changes to your hair care regime to change it from one that hinders hair growth to one that boosts hair growth. Follow these simple tips to help make sure you're helping, not hindering your hair on a daily basis -- in time it all adds up.

1. If you use gels, wash them out
   If you use hair gels, waxes, clays or any other sticky styling products you need to wash them out before you go to bed. When you sleep with your head firmly pressed against the pillow, styling products can work their way into your scalp and clog the pores. Styling products usually contain an array of chemicals that won't do newly developing hairs any good. Make sure you wash them out before bed to avoid this, or don't using sticky styling products altogether.
2. Avoid shampoos sold in supermarkets
   All the common high street brand shampoos contain chemicals that you wouldn't want to put on your skin every day, if you knew what they were. Have a look at the ingredients list on the back of your shampoo. You'll most likely see the chemical "sodium laurl sulphate", or some variation on that name. Even the top brands like Head and Shoulders, Pantene, Original Source and Herbal Essences contain this chemical and many others. With everyday use it's thought that this can damage your hair and even poison your body.
3. Avoid tightly tying your hair back
   Tying your hair back tightly pulls the hairs and gradually trains them to grow nearer to the surface of the scalp. Eventually they may grow so close to the surface that they lose their hold in the skin and fall out. The hairs at the front of your head are most likely to be the victims of this pulling and they are also the most vulnerable to the effects of hormonal hair loss.
4. Avoid brushing your hair when it's wet
   Your hair is more vulnerable to damage when it's wet. It's best to dry your hair with a soft towel and then leave it to dry naturally. Your hair will dry faster if you don't brush it as it will have a greater surface area exposed to the air. If you use leave-in conditioners don't rub them into the scalp. If you get a lot of split ends you should get your hair trimmed regularly, otherwise the splits will get longer and longer leaving your hair looking frizzy and horrible.
5. Stimulate hair growth by brushing your scalp
   When you brush your hair, use a hard bristled hair brush with plenty of space between the bristles. Make sure your hair is completely dry and vigorously brush your scalp, scratching the skin. Don't scratch so hard that it hurts but do scrape fairly hard. And don't do this if you have a dry, flaky or sore scalp. The action of scraping the scalp will help exfoliate but most importantly it will stimulate increased blood circulation in the scalp, which will bring nutrients to the hairs helping increase hair growth.

Conclusion

Most people wash and style there hair very frequently, so even if you are doing something slightly wrong, in time it will have a noticeable effect. However if you make sure you're doing everything right, plus using some simple tricks to help stimulate hair growth, in time you will see positive results.