Abstract

Background: Scars are abnormal wound responses in predisposed individuals. Most of post burn scars result in aesthetically disabling and some of them may cause functional disability. Although several approaches have been tried in their management, most of them have produced poor results. The introduction of fractional CO₂ lasers shows promising results in treating burn scars with fewer side effects. Whilst recent studies have focused on objective scar outcomes following fractional CO₂ laser, few data on patient subjective factors such as quality of life are available.

Objective: This study aims to analyse the efficacy of fractional CO₂ laser as a treatment for post burn scars from patient point of view and the degree of their satisfaction with this method of scar treatment.

Methods: We performed a retrospective study of 26 patients (18 females, 8 males) who underwent fractional CO₂ laser procedures for treatment of burn scars at dermatology clinic of Sultan Qaboos University Hospital, period from January 2017 to April 2018. Variants collected were age, gender, skin type, age of burn scar, site of scar, number of laser sessions finished and complications that occurred during or after the treatment sessions. All scars were assessed by the patients themselves through the Patient and Observer Scar Assessment Score (POSAS) form. This score assesses six variants (before and after laser sessions) including pruritus, pain, colour, pliability, thickness and relief. Each scored numerically on a ten-step scale (maximal 60). Beside that patients were asked to give overall opinion i.e, how much improvement after got treated with laser (maximal 10) compared to pre-laser treatment.) Figure 1 A Wilcoxon Signed-Ranks Test was used to compare pre and post laser treatment to assess the effectiveness of the laser.

Results: A Wilcoxon Signed-Ranks test indicated that the median post-treatment POSAS-P scores 14.0, were statistically significantly lower than the median pre-treatment POSAS-P scores 35.5, (Z= -4.46, p < .001). The overall POSAS-P scale reported significant drop from a median of 9 to 3 (Z= -4.48, p < .001). Colour of the scar showed best response compared to other variants. Among all patients treated only three patients got scarring and two patients had transient edema post laser treatment.

Conclusion: Fractional CO₂ laser use is an effective and safe method for treating burn scars with a significant change in the opinion of the patients about their scar appearance and symptoms.

Keywords: Post Burn Scar; Fractional CO₂ Laser

References

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Citation

Citation: Tarik Sulaiman Al-Nasseri. “Retrospective Study on Clinical Effect of Fractional CO₂ Laser in the Treatment of Post Burn Scar Among Patients in Sultan Qaboos University Hospital, Dermatology Clinic". Acta Scientific Medical Sciences 4.2 (2020): 126-130.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2020 Tarik Sulaiman Al-Nasseri. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.