As more and more people suffer from hair loss, sales of hair loss treatments have skyrocketed.
However, the spark is splashing on some dialysis patients with kidney disease.
Among patients receiving dialysis for kidney disease and taking high blood pressure medication, these are patients who do not take any other blood pressure medication other than a specific hair loss medication.
The dialysis patient in his 30s whom the reporters met had blood pressure that rose to 200, but only stabilized after taking this hair loss treatment.
As it turned out, this treatment was a powerful high blood pressure drug that relaxed damaged blood vessels in patients with kidney disease, but thanks to the side effect of hair growth, it became better known as a hair loss treatment.
From a pharmaceutical company's point of view, if the drug is sold as a hair loss treatment, it can be priced 16 times higher than when it is sold as a high blood pressure drug that is covered by health insurance.
The only pharmaceutical company in Korea that sold this hair loss treatment as a high blood pressure drug eventually stopped supplying it.
Today's SBS 8 News will tell you the stories and solutions of dialysis patients who are having difficulty finding high blood pressure medications due to the popularity of hair loss treatments.