An interventional study of Scalp cooling with hairstyle and Scalp cooling with conditioner and water emulsion in Alopecia, sponsored by Montefiore Medical Center. Recruiting at 1 site in United States. Open to participants aged 18 Years and older. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-10-16.
Sponsored by Montefiore Medical Center · Not applicable, Interventional, and Treatment
The purpose of this study is to evaluate hairstyling techniques aimed at increasing efficacy of scalp cooling in the prevention of chemotherapy-induced alopecia, determine scalp cooling effect on persistent chemotherapy-induced alopecia, and elucidate molecular mechanisms and predictive biomarkers associated with scalp cooling success in patients with skin of color receiving chemotherapy for breast or non-small cell lung cancer.
This study is being conducted because prior studies have found scalp cooling to be highly effective in preventing hair loss resulting from chemotherapy. However, minority representation was largely limited in completed trials. A recent study found that scalp cooling devices are less efficacious in patients with skin of color, likely because patients with skin of color have hair is predominantly types 3 (curly) and 4 (kinky), which tend to become bulkier when wet and can interfere with scalp cooling cap fitting. The investigators plan to test two techniques aimed at improving scalp cooling efficacy in patients with skin of color through hairstyling methods that minimize hair volume in order to increase cooling cap to scalp contact: 1) cornrows/braids/twists or 2) water/conditioner emulsion on hair. Preliminary data show that breast cancer patients with type 3 or 4 hair receiving taxane chemotherapy and scalp cooling using these techniques to prepare the hair for scalp cooling cap fitting all experienced hair preservation. Additionally, the investigators will also assess persistent chemotherapy-induced alopecia outcomes and incidence by following patients up to 6 months after completing treatment. Finally, specific gene expression changes in taxane-induced chemotherapy-induced alopecia in vitro have been described previously. The investigators will test the hypothesis that scalp cooling reverses such changes in chemotherapy-induced alopecia, assess for biomarkers predictive for scalp cooling success, and investigate persistent chemotherapy-induced alopecia molecular mechanisms using non-invasive transcriptome sequencing on plucked hair follicles.
511 studies on the registry are indexed under Alopecia; 128 are open to participants now.
This study's planned enrollment of 41 is below the median of 50 across 430 interventional studies indexed under Alopecia.
Browse Alopecia studies →Montefiore Medical Center is the lead sponsor of 416 studies on the registry; 69 are open to participants now.
Of its 87 completed or terminated interventional studies of FDA-regulated products, 76 (87%) have results posted.
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Go through the criteria one by one — yes, no or not sure — and take the list to your doctor or the study team. Kept in this browser only.
Patient will be starting >= 4 cycles of taxane-based chemotherapy treatment for curative intent after enrollment
a. Concurrent HER, cisplatin, cyclophosphamide therapies and doxorubicin therapies allowed
Exclusion Criteria:
Underlined terms in the criteria open these too. Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
A scale of how much an illness limits everyday activity. For people being assessed to join a study, scores run from 0 (fully active) to 4; lower is more active.
Studies most often ask for 0–1 or 0–2. Your doctor gives the score; the WHO scale uses the same steps. The full scale also has 5, which records death.
Malignancy means cancer. Criteria about another or earlier malignancy ask whether you have had a different cancer, usually within a set number of years.
Some are commonly allowed, such as treated skin cancers other than melanoma and early cancers removed completely — check the exceptions this study lists.
The US National Cancer Institute’s scale of how severe an adverse event is — any unwanted medical event during a study, such as a symptom, an illness or an abnormal test result, whether or not a treatment caused it. Whether it did is judged separately.
“Side effects of earlier treatment resolved to grade 1 or less” means they have settled to mild or gone.
Cancer that has spread from where it began to other parts of the body. “Metastatic” cancer is cancer that has spread this way.
ECOG performance status
A scale of how much an illness limits everyday activity. For people being assessed to join a study, scores run from 0 (fully active) to 4; lower is more active.
Studies most often ask for 0–1 or 0–2. Your doctor gives the score; the WHO scale uses the same steps. The full scale also has 5, which records death.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Cancer (malignancy)
Malignancy means cancer. Criteria about another or earlier malignancy ask whether you have had a different cancer, usually within a set number of years.
Some are commonly allowed, such as treated skin cancers other than melanoma and early cancers removed completely — check the exceptions this study lists.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
CTCAE grade
The US National Cancer Institute’s scale of how severe an adverse event is — any unwanted medical event during a study, such as a symptom, an illness or an abnormal test result, whether or not a treatment caused it. Whether it did is judged separately.
“Side effects of earlier treatment resolved to grade 1 or less” means they have settled to mild or gone.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Metastases
Cancer that has spread from where it began to other parts of the body. “Metastatic” cancer is cancer that has spread this way.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Scalp cooling with hairstyle (braids, twists, cornrows) to minimize hair volume and increase scalp cooling cap to scalp contact
Device: Scalp cooling with hairstyle
Scalp cooling after coating hair with conditioner and water emulsion to minimize hair volume and increase scalp cooling cap to scalp contact
Device: Scalp cooling with conditioner and water emulsion
Control with no scalp cooling
Hair will be prepared accordingly for the cooling cap fitting based on which approach the patient prefers: braids/cornrows/twists
Hair will be prepared accordingly for the fitting based on which approach the patient prefers: or conditioner and water emulsion to coat the hair.
Severity of chemotherapy-induced alopecia - hair count density
Severity of chemotherapy-induced alopecia, or CIA, as determined by hair count density from trichoscopy will be assessed. Hair count density (hair counts/cm\^2) will be summarized by study arm and analyzed using a T-test.
Time frame: 4 weeks after completion of chemotherapy, up to ~6 months total
Severity of chemotherapy-induced alopecia - adverse events
Severity of CIA will also be evaluated based on Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE Version 5.0) grading. Results will be summarized by study arm and analyzed Fisher's exact test.
Time frame: 4 weeks after the completion of chemotherapy, up to ~6 months total
Severity of persistent chemotherapy-induced alopecia (PCIA) - hair count density
Severity of PCIA, as determined by hair count density from trichoscopy will be assessed. Hair count density (hair counts/cm\^2) will be summarized by study arm and analyzed using a T-test.
Time frame: 26 weeks after completion of chemotherapy, up to ~11 months total
Severity of persistent chemotherapy-induced alopecia - adverse events
Severity of PCIA will also be evaluated based on Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE Version 5.0) grading. Results will be summarized by study arm and analyzed Fisher's exact test.
Time frame: 26 weeks after completion of chemotherapy, up to ~11 months total
Patient distress after treatment
Patient distress after treatment will be assessed by the Chemotherapy-induced Alopecia Distress Scale (CADS) scale. CADS is a 17-item self-report tool used to measure distress related to chemotherapy-induced hair loss across four domains: physical, emotional, activity, and relationship. Participants rate experiences, difficulties, or distress due to hair loss using a 4-point Likert scale ranging from 1 ("Not at all") to 4 ("Very much"), yielding an overall scoring range of 17-68, such that higher CADS scores are associated with higher distress. Results will be summarized by study arm using basic descriptive statistics.
Time frame: 4 weeks, 8 weeks, 12 weeks, and 26 weeks after completion of chemotherapy, up to ~11 months total (from the start to completion of chemotherapy)
Gene expression changes in chemotherapy-induced and persistent chemotherapy-induced alopecia
Using a non-invasive method of plucked hair follicles, the investigators will interrogate patients' hair follicle transcriptome at 26 weeks after chemotherapy completion to clarify persistent chemotherapy-induced alopecia pathogenesis. The investigators will also identify predictive markers for cooling success through transcriptome profiling on hair follicles before and after chemotherapy in intervention and control groups.
Time frame: 26 weeks after completion of chemotherapy
Plan to share: Undecided
From the registry record's own update history. This site started tracking changes on Sep 25, 2026; for anything earlier, see the record history on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
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