Choosing in Louisville, where every practice runs the same device
Every practice in our Louisville comparison is a multi-service plastic surgery group offering NeoGraft FUE — there is no dedicated hair-only local practice among reviewed results, and no reviewed practice states ABHRS certification or ISHRS membership on its hair pages. When the device is a constant, the variable is the hands: who harvests, who designs the hairline, who places the grafts. That is where a Louisville comparison is actually decided.
What the role descriptions say — verbatim
| Practice | How its own pages describe roles | Pin down at consult |
|---|---|---|
| CaloAesthetics (4 surgeons named) | “Dr. Calobrace or Dr. Quintero then places the follicles” — and elsewhere — “a certified NeoGraft technician then implants the follicles” | Which sentence describes your case, by name |
| Mays Plastic Surgery (2 physicians named) | “The team at Mays Plastic Surgery” — roles not broken out | Who harvests, who makes sites, who places — names and licensure |
Quotes from each practice's hair pages, checked August 2026. Full sourced comparison on the Louisville page.
Why “who runs the device” outranks the device
NeoGraft standardizes the harvesting mechanics of FUE. It does not decide graft angles, design a hairline that will look right at fifty, judge how hard a donor area can be worked, or place a graft. In a market where every reviewed practice offers the same machine, brochures will look alike — the ISHRS question list below is how you make the consultations differ.
The four questions, most useful in exactly this market
1. Who performs the surgery
This is the question the ISHRS puts first. Its position is that preoperative evaluation, surgical planning, donor harvesting, hairline design and recipient site creation should be performed by a licensed physician or physician extender. In practice clinics vary widely, and most patients never ask.
Ask: “Will anyone not licensed by the state be making incisions or harvesting grafts during my surgery?”
2. ABHRS board certification
ABHRS certification is specific to hair restoration and verifiable in a public registry. A surgeon can be an excellent plastic surgeon or dermatologist without holding it — that is not a disqualification, but it is a fact worth knowing, and it is checkable in two minutes rather than taken on trust.
Ask: “Is the physician who will operate on me board certified by the ABHRS?”
3. ISHRS membership
Membership in the International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery signals participation in the specialty’s standards-setting body — and the member directory is public, so the claim can be checked in one click rather than read off a logo.
Ask: “Is the operating physician a current ISHRS member I can find in the society’s directory?”
4. Who evaluates your hair loss
Hair loss has causes that require diagnosis — androgenetic alopecia, telogen effluvium, scarring alopecias and systemic conditions present differently and respond differently. The ISHRS warns that non-physician evaluation risks misdiagnosis, failure to identify hair disorders or underlying disease, and unnecessary procedures. A consultation that is really a sales appointment is a different thing from a medical evaluation.
Ask: “Who will evaluate my hair loss and recommend treatment, and what is their licensure?”
Red flags from the ISHRS consumer campaign
| Red flag | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| One flat price to harvest “as many grafts as possible” | Graft count should follow from diagnosis, not from a package. The ISHRS lists this inversion among predatory-pricing patterns. |
| The advertised surgeon is not the one in the room | The ISHRS calls this the “token doctor” pattern — a physician fronts the marketing while technicians perform substantial parts of the surgery. |
| Several patients treated simultaneously in one room | Assembly-line operation — the model that makes unlicensed-technician surgery economically attractive. |
| No one will say who makes the incisions | The first ISHRS patient question exists because delegation of surgery to unlicensed staff is the campaign’s central warning. A practice with nothing to hide answers by name. |
| Before-and-after photos that are not the clinic’s own patients | Fraudulent photography is an ISHRS-listed black-market marker. Results you are shown should be results this surgeon produced. |
| Diagnosis by a salesperson instead of a physician | Hair loss has medical causes that present differently. A consultation that is really a sales appointment risks misdiagnosis and unnecessary surgery. |
Louisville questions
Louisville has no dedicated hair clinic — should I travel instead?
Not necessarily. Multi-service plastic surgery groups can do excellent transplant work; the point is that the burden of the who-performs-what question shifts to you, because a dedicated practice answers it by existing and a multi-service one answers it at consultation. If you do weigh travel — an Indiana practice and an Istanbul clinic both court Louisville patients in search — price the follow-up trips over 12–18 months before comparing.
CaloAesthetics’ pages mention both surgeons and a NeoGraft technician — who does what?
The site describes it both ways: one passage states “Dr. Calobrace or Dr. Quintero then places the follicles”, another that “a certified NeoGraft technician then implants the follicles.” Both sentences are from the practice’s own pages. That is not a contradiction to hold against them — workflows vary by case — but it is precisely the thing to pin down for your case, by name, before booking.