Sequential Use of CO2 Laser Prior to Nd:YAG and Dye Laser in the Management of Non-Facial Warts: A Retrospective Study.

Background and Objectives: Warts are benign lesions of viral etiology characterized by a hyperkeratotic appearance tending to spread across the skin surface. Various treatments have been proposed to manage this condition, such as acids, imiquimod, photodynamic therapy, cryotherapy, and various lasers. Materials and Methods: In this paper, we describe a combination protocol using CO2 laser prior to Nd:YAG laser for lesions interesting the palmoplantar areas or dye laser for lesions on other skin surfaces in the management of non-facial warts resistant to traditional therapies. In total, 34 patients with 103 warts suffering from wart infection resistant to traditional therapies treated from 1 January 2019 to 1 June 2020 were retrospectively enrolled at the Dermatological Unit of Magna Graecia University (Catanzaro, Italy). Two dermatologists measured clinical results, classifying lesions with complete resolution, partial resolution, or non-responding. Patients at four months follow-up were asked to evaluate their degree of satisfaction with a visual analog scale (VAS). Results: Almost all patients reported the complete resolution of lesions, with no patient reporting scarring. Five patients reported hypopigmentation in the treated areas. The mean satisfaction level was high. Only three patients experienced a relapse of the condition. Conclusions: Using a vascular laser following a CO2 superficial ablation of warts may help reduce the risk of scarring and decrease the incidence of relapses for lesions resistant to traditional therapies. Therefore, more extensive studies will be necessary to confirm the obtained results.

A novel vehicle for the treatment of psoriasis.

This study evaluates the effectiveness of the topical use of an aerosol foam combination of calcipotriol 50 µg/g plus betamethasone dipropionate 0.5 mg/g (Cal/BD foam, Enstilar®) in adults with moderate plaque psoriasis. A total of 120 male and female adult psoriasis patients (53.3% male) from two Italian dermatological units were enrolled in an 8-week prospective study performed between November 2018 and January 2019. Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) was evaluated at baseline (T0) and 4 weeks (T4) of daily application, and a further evaluation was carried out 4 weeks after suspension (T8). Furthermore, the Dermatology Life Quality Index (DLQI) was evaluated at baseline and after 4 weeks of treatment (T4). At baseline, patients presented a mean PASI of 7 (7.0 ± 2.1). After 4 weeks (T4) of once-daily application, an important improvement in PASI was observed (1.1 ± 0.3). At Week 4, DLQI was reduced by 5.5 points from baseline (mean: 12 ± 3.1 at T0 vs 6.5 ± 1.8 at T4). Four weeks after suspension (T8), mean PASI was 2.6 ± 1.9, which was stable compared to the previous evaluation; only 8.3% of the treated patients showed worsening of plaque psoriasis. This study suggested that the Cal/BD aerosol foam is an effective topical therapy to treat plaque psoriasis.

Thermodynamic Balance vs. Computational Fluid Dynamics Approach for the Outlet Temperature Estimation of a Benchtop Spray Dryer.

The use of design space (DS) is a key milestone in the quality by design (QbD) of pharmaceutical processes. It should be considered from early laboratory development to industrial production, in order to support scientists with making decisions at each step of the product's development life. Presently, there are no available data or methodologies for developing models for the implementation of design space (DS) on laboratory-scale spray dryers. Therefore, in this work, a comparison between two different modeling approaches, thermodynamics and computational fluid dynamics (CFD), to a laboratory spray dryer model have been evaluated. The models computed the outlet temperature (Tout) of the process with a new modeling strategy that includes machine learning to improve the model prediction. The model metrics calculated indicate how the thermodynamic model fits Tout data better than CFD; indeed, the error of the CFD model increases towards higher values of Tout and feed rate (FR), with a final mean absolute error of 10.43 K, compared to the 1.74 K error of the thermodynamic model. Successively, a DS of the studied spray dryer equipment has been implemented, showing how Tout is strongly affected by FR variation, which accounts for about 40 times more than the gas flow rate (Gin) in the DS. The thermodynamic model, combined with the machine learning approach here proposed, could be used as a valid tool in the QbD development of spray-dried pharmaceutical products, starting from their early laboratory stages, replacing traditional trial-and-error methodologies, preventing process errors, and helping scientists with the following scale-up.

What's next in the use of opacifiers for cosmetic coatings of solid dosage forms? Insights on current titanium dioxide alternatives.

The consolidated use of coatings containing E171 (i.e. titanium dioxide, TiO2) as an opacifier has made the white color of the resulting dosage forms a quality standard in the pharmaceutical and dietary supplement fields. This color is also associated with the efficiency of the coating layer in protecting the substrate from the effects of UV rays. However, health risks related to diet exposure to TiO2 has recently been advanced and its addition in coating formulations has been seriously questioned. As a consequence, in principle safer TiO2-free formulations have been recently launched on the market, especially for coatings of dietary supplements. In this work, we evaluated the overall physico-technological characteristics and performance of immediate release tablets coated with a variety of commercial cosmetic formulations free of E171. Moreover, a quantitative method based on the CIELab color space was proposed for the first time for studying the covering/coloring performance of the coating formulations. Based on the results obtained, the possibility to achieve a satisfactory covering capability and a degree of white comparable to that of a standard TiO2-containing reference with all the commercially-available ready-to-use TiO2-free products considered, without affecting the dissolution performance, was demonstrated.