Background: Facial telangiectasia is one of the common skin vascular lesions characterized by dilated cutaneous vasculatures. The variety of diameters and difference in depths of lesional blood vessels are the major challenges for effective treatments for Facial telangiectasia. Aims: To compare the efficacy and safety profiles of pulsed dye laser (PDL, 595 nm) with intense pulsed light (IPL) configured by three different wavelength bands in the treatment for facial telangiectasia in Asian populations. Patients/Methods: A retrospective analysis of hospital records and review on photographs were performed for those subjects with facial telangiectasia (n = 160) who
Background
It has been a long‐term debate over the concomitant treatment of inflammatory acne vulgaris using intense pulsed light (IPL) and minocycline due to the photosensitivity of minocycline.
Objective
We aimed to evaluate the safety and efficiency of IPL combined with minocycline in treating acne vulgaris in a randomized trial.
Methods
A total of 40 patients were enrolled and randomly assigned into two groups which were either given minocycline (100 mg per day) for 8 weeks with IPL treatments three times at weeks 0, 4, and 8, or the same dosage of minocycline only. The evaluations for inflammatory lesion count, Investigator Global Assessment of Acne (IGA), erythema, and purpura indexes were taken before treatment and at weeks 4, 8, and 16.
Results
There were significant improvements in inflammatory lesion count, IGA scores, and purpura index in both groups as compared with the baseline at week 16 (p < 0.02). The concomitant therapy, but not minocycline only, significantly improved the erythema index (p = 0.40) at the 16th week as compared with the baseline. The group with combined treatment showed significantly continuous improvements in inflammatory lesion counts (p < 0.04) and IGA scores (p ≤ 0.02) at weeks 4, 8, and 16 as compared with the group given minocycline only. No severe adverse effects were observed during the trial.
Conclusion
IPL in combination with minocycline shows a better clinical efficacy for the treatment of inflammatory acne vulgaris than minocycline alone, and it is safe.
Generalized pustular psoriasis (GPP) is a rare and potentially life‐threatening skin disease and the clinical heterogeneity of which is largely unknown. Retrospective cohort analysis was conducted on hospitalized GPP patients between January 2010 and November 2022. A total of 416 patients with GPP and psoriasis vulgaris (PV) respectively were included, matched 1:1 by sex and age. The heterogeneity of GPP was stratified by PV history and age. Compared with PV, GPP was significantly associated with prolonged hospitalization (11.7 vs. 10.3 day, p < 0.001), elevated neutrophil lymphocyte ratio (NLR) (5.93 vs. 2.44, p < 0.001) and anemia (13.9% vs. 1.2%, p < 0.001). Moreover, GPP alone (without PV history) was a relatively severer subtype with higher temperature (37.6°C vs. 38.0°C, p = 0.002) and skin infections (5.2% vs. 11.4%, p = 0.019) than GPP with PV. For patients across different age, compared with juvenile patients, clinical features support a severer phenotype in middle‐aged, including higher incidence of anaemia (7.5% vs. 16.0%, p = 0.023) and NLR score (3.83 vs. 6.88, p < 0.001). Interleukin‐6 (r = 0.59), high density lipoprotein cholesterol (r = −0.56), albumin (r = −0.53) and C‐reactive protein‐to‐albumin ratio (r = 0.49) were the most relevant markers of severity in GPP alone, GPP with PV, juvenile and middle‐aged GPP, respectively. This retrospective cohort suggests that GPP is highly heterogeneous and GPP alone and middle‐aged GPP exhibit severe disease phenotypes. More attention on the heterogeneity of this severe disease is warranted to meet the unmet needs and promote the individualized management of GPP.
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