Phototoxic Doses of Ultraviolet A for Treatment of Alopecia Areata
Status:
Completed
Trial end date:
2014-03-01
Target enrollment:
Participant gender:
Summary
Alopecia areata (AA) is a disease of the hair follicles with multifactorial etiology and a
strong component of autoimmune origin. It is characterized by non-scarring hair loss on the
scalp or any hair-bearing surface.
Various therapeutic agents have been described for the treatment of AA, but none are curative
or preventive. The aim of AA treatment is to suppress the activity of the disease.
Phototherapy in the form of topical psoralen and ultraviolet A (PUVA) has been a well
documented therapy for AA since 1978.
A more recent technique of topical PUVA, namely phototoxic PUVA, has been adopted in two
previous studies. Sessions were carried out once every 3 months, and a higher efficacy with
more encouraging response rates in comparison to the conventional PUVA therapy has been
documented. This assumed upper hand over the conventional PUVA might be due to increasing the
amount of UV reaching the hair follicle cells and the surrounding inflammatory cells. Also it
has been suggested that it might play a role as a powerful initiating agent of suppression
through direct action at the DNA level. However, still the exact effect of this treatment has
not been fully clarified.