Hair breakage causes a lot of distress, but with a few changes to your hair care and lifestyle habits, you can start to mitigate that damage to your locks. Below, we’ll guide you through hair breakage treatments, along with tips to prevent breakage from happening in the future.
What is hair breakage?
Hair breakage happen when hair breaks off at any point along the hair shaft. This is different from hair fall, which is when hair sheds from the scalp. To understand what makes hair break, we have to take a closer look at the basic structure of the hair shaft.
Unlike the follicle, which lies beneath the scalp, the shaft is the visible part of the hair that extends out of the scalp. The shaft comprises three layers: the medulla, cortex and cuticle1. The cuticle, the outermost layer, is made up of flat cells that overlap in a fish scale-like pattern. This layer ultimately acts a protective shield for the cortex and medulla.
So, what does hair breakage look like? A normal cuticle is smooth, with fully intact scales. On the other hand, a damaged cuticle has lifted scales and struggles to retain moisture. This weakens hair strands, which causes breakage, split ends, and frizz.
Common hair breakage causes
There are a number of external factors that can damage and weaken your hair. Common hair breakage causes can include:
- Chemical treatments like bleaching, colouring, perming, relaxing and straightening treatments all affect the hair’s ability to preserve moisture, which leads to breakage.
- Excessive or continual use of hair styling tools leaves hair brittle, dry, and prone to breakage.
- Environmental stressors such as UV exposure, salt water and chlorinated water can all dry out the hair.
- Tight hair styles – including ponytails, buns, updos, tight braids, cornrows, hair extensions or weaves – can all cause hair breakage at the crown and hairline2.
- Rough handling of wet hair can increase your chances of breakage, flyaways and split ends.
How to treat and prevent hair breakage: 6 tips
If you’ve ever wondered how to stop your hair from breaking, we’ve got your covered. In addition to getting regular trims and integrating fortifying hair care products, the most effective hair breakage treatments are about prevention. This means establishing healthy hair care habits that minimise friction, tugging, pulling, heat damage and chemical processing. Read on for tips on how to prevent hair breakage and manage existing damage.
Use a fortifying shampoo and conditioner
Breakage can be what causes hair fall in many individuals, so we recommend substituting your standard shampoo and conditioner with a fortifying formula to help reinforce hair fibres and reduce hair breakage.
Specifically formulated to target hair fall caused by breakage, the Dercos Energy+ Stimulating Shampoo draws on a blend of nourishing ingredients like vitamin E and niacinamide to improve your hair’s vigour and vitality: strengthening strands from root to tip and hydrating the scalp.
Follow with the Dercos Energy + Fortifying Conditioner, which is formulated with glycerin and ceramides for hair to provide hydration and protection against external stressors.
Apply an anti-hair breakage serum
To bolster the effects of your shampoo and conditioner hair breakage treatment, we suggest incorporating an anti-hair fall serum into your hair care routine.
Our Aminexil Pro 5 uses five active ingredients to minimise breakage, increase hair density and resilience, and a massaging tip to stimulate scalp microcirculation. This serum can be used once per day for six weeks. Simply apply one ampoule per day onto dry or wet hair; do not rinse.
For maintenance, simply apply one ampoule three times per day ongoing.
Be gentle with your hair
If you’re wondering how to prevent hair breakage alongside a fortifying hair care regimen, one of the simplest lifestyle changes you can make is being gentle with your strands when brushing and tying up your hair.
Overly tight hairstyles are a common cause of hair fall in women, as the pulling and tugging can lead to unnecessary breakage. Try to avoid slick updo styles and opt for loose styles instead. You can also try a silk pillowcase and silk hair ties that minimise friction and tugging.
When it comes to brushing your hair, boar-bristle brushes are a great option for minimising hair breakage. As for technique, start brushing your ends first: gradually moving from the bottom to the top of your hair, and gliding through it without pulling.
Take care when your hair is wet
Our hair is most vulnerable when wet, so it’s important to minimise friction and pulling to avoid ‘lifting’ the cuticles – which leads to breakage. Our advice for how to stop your hair from breaking is to comb wet hair using a wide-tooth comb that gently detangles.
Instead of towel-drying your hair with terrycloth material (which creates friction and frizz), you can use a microfibre towel or soft cotton t-shirt to absorb water from freshly washed hair.
Limit heat styling tools and chemical processing
Chemical processing is one of the most common hair breakage causes, so one of the best things you can do for damaged hair is to take a break from chemical treatments. This will give your strands ample time to recover while your fortifying hair care products gradually strengthen your hair fibres.
Regular, excessive use of heat styling tools can also dry out your strands and make them more susceptible to dullness and breakage, so we suggest limiting your use of heat styling tools where possible. If you are using heat styling tools, opt for lower heat settings and always use a heat protectant.
Get regular trims
One of the most effective hair breakage treatment tips is to visit the salon for regular trims. This will prevent split ends from getting worse and snapping off higher on the hair shaft – which makes breakage and damage more noticeable.
Depending on the length of your hair, we recommend getting trims every eight to 12 weeks to prevent hair breakage and promote stronger strands overall.
Hair and scalp concerns differ at regular intervals. So, now that you understand how to prevent hair breakage, discover how to prevent dandruff from our experts.
1https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wm-biology2/chapter/hair/
2https://www.aad.org/public/diseases/hair-loss/causes/hairstyles