Kaplan hospital urges female MKs to donate hair

The hospital's hair stylist Ben-Zikri will make wigs out of donated hair for cancer patients who lost their locks to chemotherapy.

By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH
Eli Ben-Zikri 370 (photo credit: Courtesy Kaplan Medical Center)
Eli Ben-Zikri 370
(photo credit: Courtesy Kaplan Medical Center)
Female MKs and candidates for the 19th Knesset can help out cancer patients by using their heads, says the Kaplan Medical Center in Rehovot.
The hospital is urging them to donate at least 30 cm. of their hair to the hospital’s hair stylist, Eli Ben-Zikri, to make free wigs for those who have lost their locks due to chemotherapy.
Ben-Zikri, himself a cancer survivor, said on Wednesday that there is a “severe shortage” of donated hair for making natural wigs for those whose hair falls out during treatment.
“Women MKs and candidates [or any long-haired men] should be a personal example and donate their hair to the cause,” he said.
As many of the candidates this election are younger than in the past, Ben-Zikri noted that if they donate their hair – which must not have been dyed or artificially curled or straightened – it can be successfully used to make the wigs.
Even those MKs who do not meet the criteria can come to the hospital’s hair salon and promote the effort to donate natural hair.
Dr. Noa Ben Baruch, head of the oncology institute at the Rehovot hospital, said that one event that causes great emotional stress to cancer patients, especially women and children, is losing their hair due to treatment.
“In most cases, they recover from the tumor, but baldness can’t be hidden in any other way, and it harms femininity.”
A voluntary organization called PELEH, made up of a team of hairdressers and wig makers, create wigs as similar as possible to the patient’s own hairstyle.
Hospital director-general Prof. Ya’acov Yahav said that the hairdressing center was set up to benefit cancer patients and cooperates on a regular basis with the oncology institute.
Free haircuts by Ben-Zikri and his team to donate tresses can be arranged by calling 050- 679-8798.