Successful treatment of facial localized discoid lupus erythematosus with intralesional betamethasone: A report of three cases

Abstract

Discoid lupus erythematosus (DLE) is a chronic autoimmune skin disease that usually causes disfiguring scarring, dyspigmentation, and atrophy. Despite a range of available topical and systemic therapies, the treatment of DLE remains a therapeutic challenge, especially in some refractory cases. Here, we reported three male patients with long‐term chronic lesions of unilateral facial localized DLE, who failed to have their disease controlled with many previous topical/systemic treatments, showed rapid and well response to intralesional injections of betamethasone (2 mg/mL, 0.2 mL/site) monotherapy once every 2 weeks for two, two, and four times of treatment, respectively. Intralesional betamethasone may provide a safe and effective alternative in the management of refractory localized DLE skin lesions.

Diagnosis and Management of Cutaneous Manifestations of Autoimmune Connective Tissue Diseases

“…39,40 In addition to topical application, intralesional steroid injections have shown efficacy for refractory disease in patients with DLE. 41 Topical calcineurin inhibitors are another effective treatment with less risk for side effects than topical steroids. A randomized controlled trial (RCT) comparing tacrolimus with topical steroids for facial CLE found that tacrolimus was effective at improving skin disease with lower incidence of treatment-induced telangiectasia.…”

“… 39 , 40 In addition to topical application, intralesional steroid injections have shown efficacy for refractory disease in patients with DLE. 41 …”

Intralesional injection of triamcinolone acetonide is an effective treatment for angiokeratoma of the scrotum: a case report

“…Glucocorticoids have been shown to have an effect on vasoconstriction by reducing the release of factors as well as histamine [11]. Since James [12] gave the first intralesional injection of triamcinolone acetonide to treat localized dermatosis in 1960, intralesional steroid injections are now widely used in a variety of skin diseases [13,14], for which the safety and efficacy have been confirmed by numerous experiments.…”

“…In addition, it is still simple, convenient, and affordable, thus making it more acceptable to the patients. We have successfully treated a variety of local proliferative or inflammatory skin diseases with intralesional injection of glucocorticoids in our clinical practice [13]. However, the efficacy and safety of this treatment for the angiokeratoma of the scrotum, including the long-term response after injection, needs to be verified with a larger sample size.…”