My honest review of Diamond Hair Clinic. Review of Diamond Hair Clinic Booked: March 2025 Date: September 14th, 2025 Surgery type: Sapphire FUE, 4500 grafts, hairline and mid scalp Price: 6000 euros (it’s gone up to 6500 as of May 2025) How I found them: Reddit Hello, I recently had a hair transplant done by Dr. Memhet Demircioglu and would like to share my experience. Part 1: Choosing a clinic Knowing that Istanbul is the capital of hair transplants, I thought this was the best place to go. Although not the only place in the world, I know I’d be able to find a great surgeon here. Other options that don’t break the bank are Mexico and Southeast Asia, but I never explored those. I am from Canada, and there was no way I would afford a 5000 graft hair transplant (20-30k). So, I started looking at clinics exclusively in Istanbul. I generated a spreadsheet with different columns to compare potential clinics. There are A LOT of clinics in Istanbul, so it’s pretty overwhelming. The best advice I can give anyone is what I found on the Diamond Hair Clinic website. Think of clinics as 3 tiers. 3rd tier - technician-led, surgeon onsite, but many surgeries are going on at once. 2nd tier technician and surgeon-led, with a few surgeries going on at once, and the surgeon oversees all of them. The "gold standard" 1st tier - surgeon-led with his technicians as support, like any good surgeon, and 1 patient a day. I would never do a third tier, I would be cautious with 2nd tier, and 1st tier is the gold standard. Anything below 1st tier is essentially a hair mill. You can’t deliver great medical services to multiple patients a day and then provide the aftercare they need. I browsed forums, talked to people on Reddit, filled in my spreadsheet, and then started reaching out to clinics to consult with them. After going back and forth with a few clinics, looking at what I was prepared to spend, I finally found my clinic. Diamond Hair Clinic. Literally a Diamond in the rough. Part 2: Why did I choose them? It was really decided based on a few factors. The clear communication with the assistant, the price, the information that was given to me via the assistant, the surgical report, the website, and the fact that I couldn’t find one bad review on them, and all the stories on Reddit were very positive. The assistant communicated quickly with me, provided me with great information, but never felt like they were trying to convince me to choose them. The price was expensive (6000 euros), but after talking to someone who had a less-than-great experience at a 2nd tier clinic, his advice was to spend the extra money so you know you are getting a great service. Some of the best advice I got. In 10 years, you won’t remember the extra 2500 euros if it goes really well, but you will remember the extra money you didn’t spend if it didn’t go well. Their website is not flashy but really informative. Most clinics have flashy, fancy websites to attract their customers. His website was pretty bland, but it provided great, valuable information and confirmed a lot of what I already knew. Two weeks later, the report was made, and they deemed me a suitable candidate for a hair transplant. Now, most clinics do their report in a few days and are very brief. I received a 35-page PDF from Dr. Mehmet, which was very in-depth. You could see the attention to detail. I was also promised 0 surprise fees. Some clinics try to upsell you when you get there, even after your surgery. It is very unethical to sell things to patients after a surgery when they are most vulnerable. Dr. Mehmet was very transparent, honest, and upfront. Which I appreciated. The thing that actually made the most impact on me is when he refused to do the transplant I wanted him to do. I wanted him to fill in the entire hairline, mid scalp, and improve the density of the crown. Unfortunately, his estimate was 6000-7000 grafts, and he no longer does 6000 graft appointments. He maxes at 4500. I was really disappointed at first because I didn’t want to potentially have a second surgery down the road. Although he assured me that people in my scenario, people are so thrilled with their new hairline, they don’t come back for the crown, and in my case, it will be mostly covered by all the hair. Dr. Mehmet's refusal to do something proved that he has a standard of practice for himself and won’t do anything that won’t yield a good result. That is a surgeon I trust. Oh, and he only takes on 10 patients a month; some surgeons would do that in a day. I knew I was going to get the attention and the care I wanted and needed. So I booked my flight and my surgery date. I was all in. Part 3: My transplant experience. I booked 1 week of travel before, making the long journey more worth it! Then had my surgery the last three days. The process was seamless; the driver picked me up from the airport, brought me to my first hostel, and then I travelled. I paid the driver my 6000 euros as we had prearranged between the surgeon and the driver that he trusted. Yes, I was worried about handing that amount of cash. I recorded the entire transaction, took pictures, and took a license plate picture and sent it to the clinic. Within minutes, they confirmed payment was made and the money is their responsibility. I didn’t want to travel with that much money, especially when staying in hostels. Was it risky? In a sense. But I took the necessary steps to make sure that if anything went wrong, I had all the information I needed. Since I got a ride to the hostel (included in my package), I had to get myself to my hotel 7 days later, which was not a problem. I checked in late, but had issues with the check-in. They couldn’t find my booking, so the clinic contacted them immediately to clear everything up. I had a booking. Took about 25 minutes, which was annoying because it was late, and I wanted to sleep well before the big day. I was picked up at 745am the next day by my driver and brought to the clinic. I waited a bit as the surgeon had some prep to do, then he invited me to his office. We had about a 2-hour in-person consultation. This is something I read about him; he gives you so much time and explains things 3 times, 3 different ways, and in detail, so you understand everything. There is no rushing this part. He talked about the surgery, and then we went on to drawing my hairline and what I want. It was a very collaborative approach, but I trusted his expertise in what would look best. The next part was the freezing. I won’t underplay this. It hurt like A LOT. They used this gun needle to do an initial freeze, and then used actual needles. It felt like it would never end, and I would brace for each needle. He said it is around 100 total needles between the gun and the needles. I didn’t count, but I believe him. I was finally numb. Dr. Mehmet doesn’t do the extraction; his nurse does it, and he’s a pro he told me his nurse would be doing it and gave me confidence in him because he has been flown to Brazil and paid a lot of money to teach surgeons how to extract donor hairs. He also stated that his nurse is better than him at the extraction! It’s a science and an art. I lay face down for 2 hours as they excreted 4500 individual hairs. My only complaint was a more comfortable face hole on the surgery bed; it was hurting my face due to the pressure. I was warned that it could happen. We then took a break, had lunch, I used the washroom, and then we went to Stage 2, opening the channels. Dr. Mehmet did all of this by himself and explained his method during the consultation. Hair needs to be more random than in perfect rows. Perfect rows will look fake and allow light into the scalp. Rows save time and are faster, but won’t look as good. Some clinics can make all their incisions in 30-60 minutes. He took 2 hours and 6 minutes to do 4500. We took two short breaks, one for me and one for him. The next stage was implantation; two nurses did this, and it was by far the easiest part. So easy, I fell asleep with my AirPods in and was twitching on the table. That took over 2 hours, and it felt like 30 minutes. After we finished, they bandaged me up and I went back to Dr. Memhet's office and we had an hour debrief. We went over medication and washing procedures. He gave me his personal number so I can contact him at any time. Which I certainly needed because there are a lot of instructions. He also texted me all the instructions. I was very impressed with the overall day, and it was about an 11-hour day when we finished. He is very detail-oriented and over-explained everything. I would say my only surprise is that I got the impression (from Reddit) that he doesn’t leave the surgery room and does everything. He was in and out when the nurses were working on me, and did the most important part, the incisions. I’d rather he be completely fresh for that, and I had complete trust in his team. So I wasn’t worried, just misled a little bit on Reddit and didn’t even ask him in the consultation. A surgeon needs to surround himself with a great team, and he simply can't do it all. Especially when you need 100 percent of their focus. My driver picked me up, and I went back to the hotel, had dinner, took my medication, and settled in. I slept at a 45-degree angle the first and second nights as instructed. I spent the next day in my hotel killing time, watching movies, and trying not to touch anything. The next day, I was picked up by my driver. We actually got into an accident about 500 meters away from the clinic. My driver rear-ended someone; I was completely fine…the Maybach I was picked up in was not. We ended up just walking the rest of the way, and the driver carried my heavy bag. I was greeted outside by Dr. Mehmet. He apologized and said this is the second time ever that this has happened over his 10-year career. Really, it wasn’t a big deal to me. We had about another 2 hours together, going over the recovery protocol, how to wash my hair, and he answered all and the questions. He has a very detailed recovery protocol and is very conservative in his approach to maximize your results. My flight wasn’t until the evening, and they were bringing me straight to the airport. I had about 6 hours to kill before my flight and then a 19-hour journey home. Which I was not happy about, BOOK DIRECT. We keep in contact every day, and he is very good at messaging me back quickly with any questions I have, which is a lot. Would I have changed anything? It’s hard to say, but if I could find a surgeon as good as Dr. Mehmet, who could have done the 6000-7000 I needed and provided everything he did, I would probably have gone that route. I made my decision, chose someone really great, not just as a surgeon, but he really cares about his patients and their success. I’m very happy with my experience, and I hope I yield great results. We will wait and see; there’s a lot of work still to do to be the most successful. Secondly, if I knew all my hard work of trying to stop hair loss wouldn’t have worked, and would have ended up in a transplant. I probably would have gone on finasteride and potentially avoided all this years ago. Now I need a transplant and have to go on Duasteride. Hindsight is 20/20. Now all I can do is share my story with younger men than me, and they can make more informed choices. My experience 9.8/10 It lost .2 mainly for superficial reasons: I would have liked a more comfortable surgery bed, my driver got into an accident, and I had to walk the rest of the way. Lunch was cheese pizza, OJ, and water. He did go above and beyond for me. Helped arrange a secure money transfer with his trusted driver, so I didn't have to travel with so much cash. He also went out and bought a year's supply of duasteride for me. Which is about 4x the cost in Canada.