Comparative Efficacy of Injection Triamcinolone Acetonide given Intralesionally and through Microneedling in Alopecia areata

INTRODUCTION: Alopecia areata (AA) manifests as patchy hair loss and intralesional corticosteroid (ILCS) is usual therapeutic choice in limited disease. Microneedling is used for uniform delivery of topical agent to relatively larger areas may prove to be more efficacious than traditional ILCS. The present study prospectively compared microneedling to traditional intralesional delivery of triamcinolone acetonide (TA). MATERIALS AND METHODS: Prospective randomized comparative study in 60 patients of AA restricted to scalp not requiring systemic treatment randomly divided into two equal groups. Group 1 patients underwent microneedling with local application of injectable TA and Group 2 patients were given injectable TA intradermally for a total of three sessions at 3 weeks interval. RESULTS: A mean regrowth of 66.36% in Group 1 and 69.75% in Group 2 at week 9 was seen which was comparative with no significant statistical difference between the two groups (P = 0.664). Thirteen patients achieved 100% regrowth at week 9 in Group 1 and 16 patients achieved 50%–99% regrowth in Group 2. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: ILCSs have been cornerstone in the treatment of limited AA, but depth of injecting drug cannot be controlled, microneedling whereas is an effective drug delivery system and also causes release of growth factors. In this study, injectable TA used intralesionally and topically with microneedling had nearly similar efficacy in causing regrowth of hair with microneedling resulting in a more uniform but less dense regrowth of hair with lesser adverse effects.