Comparative study of fractional CO 2 laser and fractional CO 2 laser-assisted drug delivery of topical steroid and topical vitamin C in macular amyloidosis

AbstractMacular amyloidosis (MA) represents a common variant of primary localized cutaneous amyloidosis. It has a characteristic female predominance; none of the treatment modalities described is either curative or uniformly effective in patients with macular amyloidosis. To determine the effect of fractional CO2 laser in macular amyloidosis in comparison to fractional CO2 laser-assisted drug delivery of topical steroids and topical vitamin C, the study includes 10 female patients with cutaneous macular amyloidosis aged between 20 and 62  years. Patients were treated with four sessions of fractional CO2 laser with 4  weeks interval. Laser treatments were performed using fractional CO2 laser with the following parameters (power 18  W, spacing 800 μm, dwell time 600 μs, stacking 3). The lesion is divided into three areas: area 1, treated by fractional laser only; area 2, treated by fractional laser followed by topical corticosteroid application under occlusion for 24 h; and area 3, treated by fractional laser followed by topical vitamin C serum application under occlusion for 24 h. All lesions were examined clinically and histologically before the therapy and 1 month after the end of the therapy to evaluate the degree of improvement. All treated areas show significant decrease in pigmentation score after treatmen t, significant drop in rippling (P value<  0.016), and improvement of lichenification; as regards the histological improvement, there was a significant ...
Source: Lasers in Medical Science - Category: Laser Surgery Source Type: research