Serious Skin Injuries Following Exposure to Unapproved Mole and Skin Tag Removers.

Karen Konkel, Melissa Reyes, Ida-Lina Diak, Kelly Cao, Lynda McCulley

Open access · greenAbstract read

In one paragraph

Article in The Journal of clinical and aesthetic dermatology, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.

0numbers the graph read from it

0cells of the map it votes in

1citing papers in PubMed

0.4field-weighted citation impact, top 34% of its field

1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

1 citing paper in PubMed, 1 citations in OpenAlex.

Skin Injuries Following Layperson Application of Chemical Peel Products.The Journal of clinical and aesthetic dermatology · 2025
Review

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.

Karen KonkelDrs. Konkel, Reyes, Diak, and McCulley are with the Division of Pharmacovigilance, Office of Surveillance and Epidemiology at the FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Melissa ReyesDrs. Konkel, Reyes, Diak, and McCulley are with the Division of Pharmacovigilance, Office of Surveillance and Epidemiology at the FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Ida-Lina DiakDrs. Konkel, Reyes, Diak, and McCulley are with the Division of Pharmacovigilance, Office of Surveillance and Epidemiology at the FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Kelly CaoDr. Cao was with the Office of Unapproved Drugs and Labeling Compliance, and the Office of Compliance at the FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research in Silver Spring, Maryland, at the time the work was conducted.

Lynda McCulleyDrs. Konkel, Reyes, Diak, and McCulley are with the Division of Pharmacovigilance, Office of Surveillance and Epidemiology at the FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Center for Drug Evaluation and Research · US

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Objective: We sought to describe skin injuries associated with unapproved topical mole and skin tag removers containing concentrated salicylic acid, Methods: We identified skin injuries associated with unapproved non-device topical mole and skin tag removers reported to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) through October 30, 2021 or described in Amazon consumer product reviews between 2019 and 2021. Results: We identified 38 cases, including 30 from Amazon consumer product reviews and eight reported to the FDA. Twenty-eight were from 2021. The most common reason for use was for mole and/or skin tag removal. Listed ingredients included salicylic acid, Limitations: Limitations include underreporting of adverse events to the FDA, limited clinical details and potential bias in consumer reviews, and poor replicability of review searches due to the dynamic nature of the Amazon website. Conclusion: Unapproved, non-device topical mole and skin tag removers are associated with serious skin injuries. We found Amazon consumer reviews to be a novel and useful data source for safety surveillance of these types of skin products. When dermatologists are consulted about skin injuries, exposure to these products should be considered in the differential diagnosis.

Indexed as

Acrochordonadverse drug reactionsblack salvechemical burndiagnostic self-evaluationdrug-related side effectsmolemole removalmole removernevusnonprescriptionover the counter (OTC)salicylic acidSanguinaria canadensisself-medicationskin injuryskin tagskin tag removalskin tag removertopical productunapproved

Identifiers

PMID36743972

PMCPMC9891211

OpenAlexW4319293618

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata

Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.