Body hair growth in women: normal or hirsute.

Abstract

The distribution and density of terminal hair growth in 19 different body regions in 113 women of fertile age complaining of embarrassing hair growth (group A) are compared with the findings in 100 normal women of comparable age (group B). Apart from three regions the former group demonstrated significantly more frequent and heavier hair growth than the latter. A stepwise discriminant analysis showed that the best separation between the two groups could be obtained by assessing the hair growth in the lip, chin, and public region. With this set of variables, four women from group A were incorrectly classified as belonging to group B and one woman from group B was classified as belonging to group A. The serum concentration of testosterone was significantly higher and the serum concentration of TeBG significantly lower in group A than in group B (P less than 0.001). Menstrual pattern, body weight, and hereditary factors in group A vs. group B support the impression that the increased terminal hair growth found in group A is due to physiological factors. From the present data it can be concluded that appraisal of the facial and public terminal hair growth should in most cases be sufficient for separating possible hirsutism from normal hair growth in women.