IN-VIVO ASSESSMENT OF THE ATROPHOGENIC POTENCY OF MOMETASONE FUROATE,A NEWLY DEVELOPED CHLORINATED POTENT TOPICAL GLUCOCORTICOID AS COMPARED TO OTHER TOPICAL GLUCOCORTICOIDS OLD AND NEW

Topical glucocorticoids still belong to the most important medications available in dermatotherapy. The clinical use of topical glucocortico ids, however, nowadays is limited by the fear of side-effects both sys temic and local, especially skin atrophy. The purpose of this study wa s to assess the atrophogenicity potential of newly developed topical g lucocorticoids which were said to show an increased benefit-risk ratio . The test preparations comprised mometasone furoate, the correspondin g vehicle, prednicarbate and hydrocortisone. They were applied once or twice daily for 6 weeks in healthy volunteers. Skin thickness was ass essed weekly by using high frequency pulsed ultrasound. Clinically, no ne of the volunteers showed any sign of overt skin atrophy. Skin thick ness, however, was reduced to a certain extent with all trial preparat ions including the base preparation. As to be expected from previous e xperiments the results for hydrocortisone and prednicarbate did not di ffer significantly from the ones for the base preparation. Interesting ly, the same applied to mometasone furoate. These findings, together w ith the other available data, give evidence of an increased benefit-ri sk ratio as compared to previous medium potent topical glucocorticoids . This might be of particular interest facing psoriasis vulgaris where an antiproliferative activity of a drug is needed.