Enhanced Percutaneous Permeation After Fractional Thermo-Ablation: an Ex Vivo Study

Background: Thermo mechanical ablation (TMA) is a novel platform for fractional ablation and non-ablation for skin treatment with no pain. Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the effects of TMA pre-treatment to facilitate transdermal drug delivery. Methods: Novoxel’s proprietary Tixel ® TMA system was evaluated in this study by a diffusion cell system using excised porcine ear skin. A 1 cm 2 tip, composed of a matrix of metallic pyramids, applied on freshly excised pig ear skin samples was operated at an ablative temperature of 400 o C for 6ms and 9ms. Verapamil hydrochloride 1% was used as a hydrophilic model drug known to have a poor absorption across mammal skin. Results: The present study has demonstrated that Tixel treatment for 9 or 6 ms increased skin permeability for verapamil along a 24-hour application period, with a highly significant difference relative to non-treatment control (p<0.05). After 24 hours, the cumulative amount of the drug that had penetrated into 9ms Tixel-treated skin was 728.6 (±358.0 SD) μg/cm 2 (n=11) compared to 33 (±25 SD) μg/cm 2 that penetrated across untreated skin (n=8). Conclusions: Fractional TMA effectively enhanced verapamil skin penetration.