Transepidermal Drug Delivery of Minoxidil Via Either Fractional Carbon Dioxide Laser or Microneedling Versus Its Topical Nanoparticles Preparation for Treatment of Alopecia Areata

Alopecia areata (AA) is the most common cause of non-scarring alopecia. (Hordinsky, 2013).

Although many patients improve spontaneously or respond to standard therapy, in patients with more severe and refractory disease, management can be quite challenging (Messenger et al., 2012 and Kranseler and Sidbury, 2017).

Corticosteroids either topical or intralesional are the most popular medications used to treat this condition. Other therapies such as topical minoxidil (MXD), anthralin, immunotherapy, systemic corticosteroids are also commonly used with variable success (Shumez et al., 2015).

Patients treated with MXD 5% have significant hair growth than placebo. Minoxidil was more effective for patchy alopecia than other types of AA such as ophiasis and alopecia totalis. It was ineffective in alopecia universalis (El-Taib et al., 2017).

In contrast, the incidence of adverse events associated with 10% MXD treatment was higher than with 5% MXD treatment. Therefore, new approaches are required to achieve both expected efficacy and safety (Oaku et al., 2022).