On Monday, December 22, 1997, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a pill designed to help men stop losing their hair and even grow their hair back (not on their backs, just back). It's called Propecia, and undoubtedly you've seen it advertised on the tube. The drug is actually a lower dose of an older drug that men took to treat enlarged prostates. When these men took the prostate drug, some seemed to stop losing their hair, and a few grew some of their hair back. We're talking real hair too, not just fuzz.

While Rogaine is a pain to administer, apparently, and works for about 40 percent of users, Propecia is simply a one-a-day pill that studies have shown is effective for re-growing hair in many men. There are some catches, however. First of all, results are never guaranteed. Always remember that, with anything. Secondly, Propecia is efficacious in treating men with male pattern hair loss (androgenetic alopecia), but its effectiveness in treating bitemporal recession has not been established. In other words, it will treat men with mild to moderate (not complete) hair loss on the crown of their head or in the middle of the front of their heads; the pill has not been shown to be effective against that hairline that recedes diagonally backwards up both your temples. You know what I mean - those power alleys. In addition, the drug should never be used or handled by women, because it may cause a serious birth defect in male fetuses (i.e. problems with the development of their sexual organs).

Most "importantly," for the man's man, some (less than 2 percent) of men experienced decreased libido and erectile dysfunction. That's too bad, huh? You get the girl because you've got hair (so they say), and then all you can do is sit together and play monopoly. I guess we're lucky we now also have sildenafil citrate. Viagra. Anyway, those side effects for Propecia users tended to go away after continued use, according to the makers of the drug.

So if you're worried about hair loss, take a trip to your physician's office and discuss your options. This pill bodes well for the future, when I guarantee you we'll all be popping pills to treat previously untreatable conditions. Eventually, the pill also will be available for women who lose their hair. But for all of us now, as David Letterman said in 1998, "If the pills don't work, you can take the cotton balls out of the bottle and glue them to your head."