Scars clinical trials at University of California Health

When patients have surgery on the head and face, stitches are the standard way to close the wound. Wounds always result in a scar, but doctors are always looking for ways to reduce scarring. Several studies have been done to test ways to close wounds that reduce scarring. One idea is to reduce the tension around the cut. One way to reduce tension is to stitch a small piece of a special gauze over the top of the regular stitches. This procedure is called a "tie-over bolster dressing." As the name implies, this extra dressing "bolsters" the wound closure so that the skin on each side of the cut stays in place. The bolster dressing procedure has been used in the past in special cases, such as when skin grafts are necessary. The bolster dressing helps the skin graft heal by making sure the graft stays exactly in place. Keeping the wound stable with a bolster dressing also reduces bleeding under the wound. For non-grafted wounds, the bolster dressing procedure has not normally been used, and has not been well-studied. In this study the whole wound will be stitched normally and then the bolster dressing will be applied over half of the wound. This will allow us to see if the side with the bolster dressing heals with less scarring.

The purpose of this study is to determine the potential influence of sun protection on the aesthetic outcome of post-surgical scars following the reconstruction of Mohs micrographic surgery defects via linear repair. This study will be performed as a randomized split-wound study. Half of the wound will be treated with zinc containing sunscreen and the other half of the wound would not be treated. Three-months post-surgery, the scar will be evaluated via the patient observer scar assessment scale (POSAS), a validated scar instrument, as well as a colorimeter to measure the amount of vascularity, and hyperpigmentation between the treated and the non-treated area compared to the 'surrounding skin' defined as skin in the proximity but not adjacent to the wound. Any adverse events will also be recorded.

When patients have surgery on the head and face, stitches are the standard way to close the wound. Wounds always result in a scar, but doctors are always looking for ways to reduce scarring. Several studies have been done to test ways to close wounds that reduce scarring. The most commonly performed closure technique uses running sutures, where a single strand of suture is continued along the length of the wound with a series of uninterrupted stiches. However, alternative closure techniques exist such as the running locking suture, which can offer advantages such as improved tension and thus reduce post-operative complications with better aesthetic outcome. In this study, half the wound will be stitched with standard running sutures and the other half will be stitched with running locking sutures. This will allow us to see if the side with running locking sutures heals with less scarring.

Oftentimes, following surgery on the scalp, wounds are left to heal by themselves. This is called "second intention." Open wounds left to heal on the scalp often take 8 weeks or more to completely heal. The investigators are investigating how second intention closure compares to another established reconstruction technique, called "pinch graft." In the pinch graft technique, a dermatological surgeon numbs and then shaves off a thin piece of skin (usually from the groin area) and places it in the wound bed it (also known as "grafting"), to encourage growth of new healthy skin. This study will compare time-to-healing in the second intention method versus the pinch graft method.