Warts, caused by the Human Papilloma Virus and is widely known as common warts while health professionals call it a condyloma acuminate. They can be defined as small fleshy bumps on the skin, mostly found in adults & children. Often, they don’t require any treatment but sometime they might require medical intervention. Though wart goes away on its own, it may take years to happen that and some people just need to get rid of warts faster.
Duct tape is widely used home-remedy to get rid of common warts especially plantar warts. Various studies show that it gives good results in common warts as compared to cryotherapy.[04] But in some cases, it may not yield any fruitful results.
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How to use duct tape to remove warts?
To use duct tape to get rid of warts you need to take the following steps –
1. Clean the area around the wart and let it dry for few minutes.
2. Once it becomes dry, directly apply the small piece of duct tape over the wart and leave it in place for six days.
3. After six days, remove the duct tape and soak the affected area with warm water.
4. Then gently scrub the wart with pumice stone or emery board.
5. Keep the wart open for next 12 hours then re-apply duct tape again and repeat the procedure until wart vanishes.
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If required, get the duct tape from Amazon.
Why does duct tape remove warts?
Though the real reason behind the efficacy of this home remedy is unclear, it has been said that prolonged application of duct tape triggers the keratolytic and maceration response of the skin which eventually leads to wart removal. [01]
Use of duct tape to remove warts is called as ‘Duct Tape Occlusion Therapy’ and this therapy has limited clinical results that favour its use to treat warts. [02] [03] But being an easy treatment solution that can be practised with a simple household product, this home remedy became widely popular in those who are seeking the faster recovery from warts.
As we discussed, warts are caused by human papillomavirus and duct tape treatment does not help to remove the actual virus instead it works as a local remedy that removes the wart. Even some clinical trials yield the good results and also found that duct tape occlusion therapy (also known as DTOT) is a significantly more effective way to treat common warts than cryotherapy.[04]
[thrive_text_block color=”light”] Bottom Line: Duct tape occlusion therapy does show modest results in removing warts on extremities but as an easy way of treatment one should try it once before practising other lines of treatment (surgery, cryotherapy, freezing of warts etc) to kill warts.[/thrive_text_block]
References:
[01] GKwok, CS; Gibbs, S; Bennett, C; Holland, R; Abbott (2012). “Topical treatments for cutaneous warts”.
https://doi.org//10.1002/14651858.CD001781.pub3
[02] Marloes de Haen, MD; Marcus G. Spigt, PhD; Caro J. T. van Uden, PhD; Pierre van Neer, MD; Frans J. M. Feron, MD; André Knottnerus, PhD. “Efficacy of Duct Tape vs Placebo in the Treatment of Verruca Vulgaris (Warts) in Primary School Children”. DOI: 10.1001/archpedi.160.11.1121
[03] Rachel Wenner, MD; Sharone K. Askari, MD; Peter M. H. Cham, MD; Deborah A. Kedrowski, RN; An Liu, MS; Erin M. Warshaw, MD, MS. “Duct Tape for the Treatment of Common Warts in Adults A Double-blind Randomized Controlled Trial”. DOI: 10.1001/archderm.143.3.309
[04] Focht DR 3rd, Spicer C, Fairchok MP. “The efficacy of duct tape vs cryotherapy in the treatment of verruca vulgaris (the common wart)”.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12361440