pISSN : 1226-4709 eISSN: 2465-8278
Open Access, Peer-reviewed
pISSN : 1226-4709 eISSN: 2465-8278
Open Access, Peer-reviewed
See Hyun Lee,Mi Youn Park,Ji Young Ahn
Epub 2016 February 17
Abstract
Background: The major limitations of the current therapeutic treatments for onychomycosis are the recurrence of the infection and the duration of the treatment. Recently, photodynamic therapy (PDT) is thought to be a novel alternative method for treatment of onychomycosis.
Objective: The aim of this study is to investigate the efficacy and safety of PDT with methyl 5-aminolevulinic acid (MAL) for the treatment of onychomycosis.
Methods: We performed MAL-PDT in eight patients with distal subungual onychomycosis on at least one great toenail. After the total three treatments, we observed the clinical and mycological courses for twelve months.
Results: For the twelve months of follow-up period, three patients (37.5%) showed continuous clinical improvement, two patients (25%) aggravation after transient improvement, and the rest, three patients (37.5%) resistance to treatment. All subjects complained of quite severe burning pain during irradiation of light source.
Conclusion: In this study, we observed the highly variable clinical and mycological results of PDT in onychomycosis. We concluded that it is too difficult to consistently achieve the best fungicidal effect by PDT without strictly selected conditions.
Keywords
Methyl 5-aminolevulinic acid Onychomycosis Photodynamic therapy
