BBC doctor reveals how grey hair can be caused by stress

A BBC doctor has explained why stress can cause your hair to turn grey.

Dr Xand van Tulleken, who is known for presenting the CBBC children’s series Operation Ouch!, has given a deep dive into health facts, running through social media scams and health scares, while also shining a light on bad medicine practices.

Speaking on Con or Cure, which is co-hosted by journalist Ashley John-Baptiste, Dr Xand revealed that “it’s not a myth” that stress “does play a role” in hair turning grey.

With Con or Cure now on its third series, the TV doctor explained that it’s the melanocyte (the pigment producing cells that make melanin, pigment responsible for skin and hair colour) that stop working when you’re stressed. This turns the hair white or grey because it has no pigment.

He explained: “Basically that’s the default colour. And stress can definitely contribute to those pigment producing cells working less well in several different ways.”

As we age, our hair “gradually loses its natural pigment due to a decline in melanocytes”, New York dermatologist Hadley King told Vogue. Despite most of our tendencies to go grey is genetic, Dr Xand confirmed that “the general inflammation of stress in the body contributes to it” and can be “sped up” by stress.

Regardless of the type of stress you’re feeling, Victoria Barbosa, associate professor of dermatology at the University of Chicago Medicine, confirmed that stress “can have an effect on the sympathetic nervous system” due to the mitochondria in cells. “[But] more studies are needed to better understand these mind-body connections,” she told the magazine.

The Oxford trained doctor’s statement can be backed by a study published in Nature, which was funded in part by NIH’s National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS). They found that the sympathetic nervous system plays a critical role in stress-induced hair greying.

Led by Dr Ya-Chieh Hsu of Harvard University, the research team used mice to investigate stress and its relation to hair greying. The mice were exposed to three types of stress – short-term pain, psychological stress, and restricted movement, all of which resulted in noticeable loss of melanocyte stem cells and subsequent greying.

The researchers then explored various potential causes including the stress hormone corticosterone, immune responses and neurotransmitter noradrenaline.

They found that noradrenaline was the main cause of hair turning grey. They found that noradrenaline, the main neurotransmitter of the sympathetic nervous system and a key player in the body’s “fight or flight” response was the primary trigger for hair turning grey.