Warts are a common skin disease caused by infection of the human papilloma virus. Most treatments involving physical destruction of the infected cells, such as cryotherapy and electrocautery, are limited by intense pain, failure, or recurrences. Our aim was to compare the therapeutic effects of a newly developed bleomycin microneedle patch with cryotherapy in the treatment of warts. Forty-two patients with more than two wart lesions were included in the study. The two treatment modalities were randomly applied to different warts on each patient. Treatment efficacy was assessed using the Physician's Global Assessment (PGA) and the Patient's Global Assessment (PaGA). Mean PGA and PaGA scores were not significantly different between cryotherapy and bleomycin microneedle patch treatment. It was also determined that the mean size of all the warts treated with either modality shrank about equally at weeks 8 and 16 after initial treatment. Thus, treatment efficacy of the bleomycin microneedle patch was comparable to that of conventional cryotherapy. According to a visual analogue scale of pain, bleomycin microneedle patch treatment was significantly less painful than cryotherapy (p < .0001). In addition, use of the bleomycin microneedle patch was more tolerable for patients who were reluctant to receive the painful treatment. Thus, the bleomycin microneedle patch can be an effective, convenient, and innovative treatment modality for warts.

Transdermal delivery using microneedles is gaining increasing attention from pharmaceutical and cosmetic companies as one of the promising drug delivery methods. Microneedle products have recently become available on the market, and some of them are under evaluation for efficacy and safety. To be available in the market for cosmetic and therapeutic use, several factors should be considered, including pain, anxiety, convenience and safety. These factors are summarized and reviewed in this article according to type of microneedle. Various kinds of materials have been used for manufacturing microneedles and developing drug formulations for microneedles. Safety information about materials used for microneedles is summarized in terms of type of microneedles. In addition to their biocompatibility, mechanical safety is also discussed. This review can provide guidelines for designing microneedle products for proper use.

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Thermal imaging provides information regarding the general condition of the human body and facilitates the diagnosis of various diseases. Heat therapy or thermotherapy can help in the treatment of injuries to the skin tissue. Here, we report a wearable thermal patch with dual functions of continuous skin temperature sensing and thermotherapy for effective self-care treatment. This system consists of a graphene-based capacitive sensor, a graphene thermal pad, and a flexible readout board with a wireless communication module. The wearable sensor continuously monitors the temperature variation over a large area of the skin (3 × 3cm 2 ) with high resolution and sensitivity and performs thermotherapy via the graphene-based heater mounted at the bottom of the device. Animal studies prove that the proposed system can be used to diagnose various diseases. This technology could be useful in the development of convenient and wearable health care devices.

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