How to Vet a Hair Transplant Clinic Abroad

To vet a hair transplant clinic abroad, start with one question: who, by name, will harvest your grafts and make the incisions in your scalp? Everything else (the facility's licence, the price, the hotel, the reviews) comes after that answer, because it is the step where illicit clinics cut corners and the step that decides both the result and the damage. This guide turns that question into a set of checks you can do from home, for free, before you pay anything.

We do not name or rank clinics. The method below works for any clinic in any country, and it is the same one we would use ourselves.

Why "who holds the punch" comes first

The person doing the surgical steps matters more than any other detail, because unlicensed technicians doing those steps is the specific failure hair-restoration surgeons warn about. The International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery (ISHRS) runs a campaign called "Fight the FIGHT" against illicit clinics. It describes clinics that use technicians without medical licences or surgical training to do graft removal, hairline design and the scalp incisions.

The ISHRS lists the complications it sees from this: scarring, unnatural hairlines, poor hair growth, wrong hair direction, depleted donor areas and infections. In its 2025 practice census, published on 13 May 2025, 59% of member surgeons reported black-market clinics in their cities (51% in 2021), and members said an average of 10% of their repair cases followed a previous black-market transplant (6% in 2021). Those are self-reported figures from member surgeons, not a census of clinics, but they explain why this question is first.

"Punch" here means the small round tool used in FUE to cut around each graft before it is removed. Whoever holds it is doing surgery.

Check 1: get the doctor's name and look it up

Ask the clinic, in writing, for the full name of the doctor who will examine you and of the doctor who will perform the extraction and incisions, with their medical registration number. A real answer names a person. "Our medical team" is not an answer.

Then look the name up yourself on the official register for that country; do not rely on a link the clinic sends you. The registers we found are:

• Turkey: the Ministry of Health publishes lists of healthcare providers authorised for international health tourism, which checks the facility (see check 2); ask the clinic for the doctor's Turkish diploma and registration details as well.
• Mexico: the SEP (Secretaría de Educación Pública) runs a free lookup of professional licences, the cédula profesional.
• Thailand: the Medical Council of Thailand has an online doctor check.
• India: the National Medical Commission publishes the Indian Medical Register.
• Dubai: the Dubai Health Authority offers a licence check for healthcare professionals.

You can also search the doctor's name on the ISHRS "Find a Doctor" directory. A listing there is membership of a professional society, not proof of skill, and not every good surgeon is a member; but a doctor who is listed and who confirms in writing that they do the surgical steps personally is giving you two things to hold them to.

Check 2: confirm the facility is authorised

In Turkey, ask for the facility's exact legal name and find it on the Ministry of Health's list of providers authorised for international health tourism. The Health Türkiye platform, run by USHAŞ under the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, states that all healthcare facilities and intermediary organisations offering international medical tourism services must hold an International Health Tourism Authorization Certificate.

If an agency or facilitator is booking you in, it counts as an intermediary under that rule, so ask for its certificate too. For destinations outside Turkey, ask the clinic which authority licenses the facility, then check that authority's own website rather than a certificate image the clinic sends.

Check 3: collect the answers in writing

Written answers are the only kind you can compare, and the only kind you can point to later. Send each clinic the same list by email and wait for replies before you talk prices.

1. Which doctor examines me, and which doctor performs the extraction and incisions?
2. Which steps, if any, are done by technicians or nurses, and who supervises them in the room?
3. How many grafts do you propose, and why, after seeing photographs of my donor area?
4. What exactly does the price include and exclude, in one currency?
5. What are the deposit and refund terms, including if the doctor declines to operate on the day?
6. What aftercare do you provide after I fly home, for how long and in what language?
7. What will you do, and pay for, if I develop a complication once I am home?
8. Is malpractice insurance in place, and who holds it?

Questions 1, 2 and 8 are adapted from the ones the ISHRS itself suggests patients ask.

Check 4: read the answers for red flags

Some answers tell you to stop, however good the price looks. Walk away if a clinic will not name the operating doctor, if it quotes a price and a graft number before anyone has seen your scalp, or if it pushes a deposit to hold a discount that expires in days.

Be wary, too, of answers that sidestep the question. A reply that sends before-and-after galleries instead of naming a doctor is answering a question you did not ask. Any promise about how your hair will look is a promise nobody can keep: no one can say in advance exactly how grafts will grow, and a transplant does not stop the hair around them from thinning. The ISHRS also notes that despite advertising claims of "a no scar technique", FUE almost always leaves small round scars.

Check 5: plan the return before you book

A clinic that does good surgery can still leave you without care at home, so check the aftercare plan as carefully as the surgeon. UK government guidance on treatment abroad says healthcare after treatment may be limited in the country you travel to, that the FCDO cannot usually help if you went abroad for medical treatment, and that standard travel insurance does not normally cover elective surgery abroad.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) advises seeing a travel medicine clinician four to six weeks before a medical trip, carrying copies of your medical records and medication lists, and arranging follow-up care before you leave. Our guide to aftercare after flying home sets out what that plan should cover.

What reviews can and cannot tell you

Online reviews tell you about the booking experience far more reliably than about the surgery. Many are written in the first days after the operation, long before anyone can judge the growth, and some sites that rank clinics are paid by clinics or earn a commission on bookings without saying so plainly.

Use reviews for what they are good at: how quickly a clinic answered, whether the person who operated was the person promised, and whether the clinic answered when something went wrong. Treat a review that praises a result in the first weeks with caution, and a site that ranks clinics without saying who pays it with more.

A one-page vetting sheet

If you keep only one thing from this guide, keep this list and fill it in for every clinic you consider.

• Operating doctor named, with a registration you found yourself.
• Steps done by others stated, with supervision.
• Facility found on the official authorised list.
• Graft number proposed with the doctor's reason.
• Price itemised in writing, with refund terms.
• Aftercare after you fly home described in writing.
• Complication plan and insurance described in writing.

A clinic that fills every line is worth comparing on price. A clinic that leaves lines blank is not, whatever it costs. For the full picture of risks and costs, see our main guide to a hair transplant in Turkey. If you are weighing up DHI offers, read what DHI marketing leaves out next.

The checks that cost nothing

Every check on this page is free, and none of them earns this site anything. So is the one before all of them: a GP or dermatologist at home, who can tell you whether surgery is the right step at all.