Polyurethane patch removes ugly scars
Polyurethane patch removes ugly scars
Emmy Fitri, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The scars we carry on our body tell a lot about us. Some of these stories are good, the kind we want to share with the people we meet. Other stories we keep all to ourselves because they are too painful.
Or, as Wolfgang Meyer-Ingold of the Hamburg-based Beiersdorf AG said, "There are scars to show off and scars to hide."
The Mursi people of Ethiopia, for example, are eager to show their scars because in their culture, scars on the arm are symbols of honor gained in fighting or hunting.
He also told of a midwife who examined a woman pregnant with her second child. The first baby was born by caesarean section. When the midwife made a remark about her caesarean scar, the woman began to cry.
"The woman was still embarrassed by the scar. She didn't even like her husband to see her naked," Meyer-Ingold said.
Meyer-Ingold said Beiersdorf began research in 1995 on treating scars to make them less noticeable.
"Our clinical investigations were aimed at evaluating the potential of polyurethane-based patches to treat scars," he said during a media workshop last week.
Beiersdorf is the producer of Hansaplast Scar Reducer, which enters the Indonesian market in 2005.
In addition to Beiersdorf's study, there have been six similar studies on the uses and benefits of the adhesive hydroactive polyurethane undertaken by different groups in Europe.
Indonesian Rama Tjandra, an obstetrician and gynecologist at Jakarta's Gatot Subroto Army Hospital, was also called to study the effectiveness of the invention.
His subject of interest was the treatment of scars over a period of 10 weeks using hydroactive polyurethane patches on the scars for at least 12 hours a day.
"A hydroactive polyurethane dressing, the plaster, gives renewed hope for better scar treatment of hypertrophy and keloid," Rama said during the workshop.
The assessment of the effectiveness of the plaster on a scar includes the scar's redness, elevation, roughness, feeling of tension and itchiness.
"Basically there is a significant reduction of redness, elevation, tightness and itchiness of scars after between eight and 10 weeks," Rama said.
Dermatologist Tina Wardhani Wisesa said keloids, thick scars resulting from excessive growth of fibrous tissue, could occur equally in both sexes.
"Colored and white skin have an equal opportunity to form keloids. The reason for their growth is still unknown but the factors contributing to their development are race, genes, location, the tension around the scar, the type of scar and hormones," she said.
Scar trauma can result from surgery, cuts, vaccinations, tattoos or acne. People may be aware of conventional treatments for scars like plastic surgery, the use of silicon gel, direct injection, radiation, laser surgery or the application of skin cream.
"Those kinds of treatments tend to be expensive, take a lot of time and sometimes are too painful," she said.
The sooner a scar is treated the better. The polyurethane works best for scars less than six months old.
Treating scars is not only about how we look but also about health concerns.
"Some scars develop and numbness develops around them. Some others might grow into elevated tissue on our skin."
So check yourself, are there any scars you need to hide?