John Peter Cole MD

John Peter Cole, MD practices in Atlanta, Georgia, Chevy Chase, Maryland, Cleveland, Ohio, and Charlotte, North Carolina. Dr. Cole attended Mercer University on an academic scholarship from the United States Army and graduated summa cum laude with a degree in biology and chemistry in 1981. He continued on to the Medical College of Georgia, where he received his medical degree in 1985. Dr. Cole completed his postgraduate medical training at the University of Missouri in the field of internal medicine. He has dedicated his practice solely to the field of hair transplant surgery since 1990. He has maintained a private practice in hair restoration since that time. He is a member of the International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery, the American Society of Hair Restoration Surgery, and the American Academy of Cosmetic Surgery.

Dr. Cole was among the first thirty physicians to become a Diplomat of the American Board of Hair Restoration Surgery. He serves on the Board of Directors and examination committee for the American Board of Hair Restoration Surgery. In the interest of sharing his knowledge to improve the field of hair transplantation, Dr. Cole has written and presented many papers, both to hair transplantation societies and at educational seminars.

Dr. Cole maintains a keen interest in the development of instruments to refine hair transplantation procedures, and creative research in follicular anatomy and has developed mathematical formulas to accurately measure human performance in hair restoration surgery. In 1999 Dr. Cole was awarded a research grant from the International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery for his work on regional variation in hair diameter and hair density. He presented the current findings from this research at the 2000 meeting of the International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery. In December 2000, Dr. Cole orchestrated the Beginner’s Program at the International Society of Hair Restoration’s annual medical conference in Hawaii whereby he trained over 75 physicians in the processes and techniques of hair transplantation. Dr. Cole is an invited speaker to the first Korean Workshop on Hair Restoration, the 2001 European Society of Hair Restoration Surgery in Barcelona, and the 2001 Italian Society of Hair Restoration Surgery meeting in Sicily. Dr. Cole will function as Co-chair at the Aegean meeting of hair restoration surgery in Athens, Greece in 2002. At the 2000 International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery meeting, Dr. Cole and Dr. Devroye were awarded First Place by the International Society of Hair Restoration for their poster presentation entitled, “Computer Applications in Hair Transplantation.” Dr. Cole was awarded the Archimedes Award in 2001 and the Michelangelo Award in 2002 by the Italian Society of Hair Transplant Surgery. He was named to the Research Committee of the International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery in 1999. Dr. Cole functioned as director of the Beginners Program at the International Society Meeting of Hair Restoration Surgery meeting in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. He is in charge of the audio-visual committee of the ISHRS meeting in Puerto, Vallarta. His most recent scientific project is developing improved optics for the dissection and harvesting of white hairs using physics and lasers. Dr. Cole is chairman of the International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery meeting in Chicago, Illinois.

Dr. Cole has invented numerous instruments to improve the speed and efficiency of hair restoration surgery. These include instruments to harvest the donor region, instruments to prepare the recipient sites, and most recently a translucent slivering board to assist in the preparation of thin strips of donor tissue over 1 cm in length and 1 mm wide. This slivering board is transparent and allows for both top and bottom fiberoptic lighting. The combination of both improves visualization of the grafts and decreases trauma to the individual hairs. The production of thin slivers speeds the production of grafts, approaching a rate of 450 per hour, with minimal risk of damage to the hairs.

Teaching: ISHRS Beginners course 98, 99, 2000, 2001. Italy 1997 beginners course. European 2001 Beginners course. Korean Live surgery workshop 2001. Numerous physicians have visited Dr. Cole for advanced training in hair transplant surgery. Dr. Cole’s office is always open to those wishing to advance the field of hair transplant surgery. Dr. Cole Served on the faculty of the WHRS in 1999 and 2002. Articles: Dr. Cole has published several articles in the Hair Transplant Forum on nomenclature, the use of trigonometry to accurately calculate the donor harvest, how to estimate the recipient area, how to estimate the size and number of follicular units, how to maximize donor yield, how to measure the distance between the grafts based on the density and the pattern of distribution, how to predict coverage, and predicted yield.; He co-authored the chapter on Donor Harvesting for Dr. Walter Unger’s new text entitled Hair Transplantation. Dr. Cole was interviewed by Cosmetic Surgery Times on Donor Harvesting in 1998, which resulted in a featured article.

Presentations: Maximizing Donor yield, donor harvesting, mathematics of follicular transplantation, microscope vs loops comparison, etiology of hair loss, mustache transplantation, the metamorphic changes to surgically excised hairs, biological switches, the geometry of scalp reduction surgery, and the physics of light. Dr. Cole has held numerous seminars across the United States on the cause and treatment of androgenic alopecia to the lay public.

Dr. Cole’s other interests include computers, electronics, flying, snowboarding, water skiing, snow skiing, baseball, wakeboarding, golf, dressage, and raising his children.