Successfully treated superficial basal cell carcinomas with ingenol mebutate 0.05% gel: Report of twenty cases.

Surgery is the therapy of choice in the guidelines to treat basal cell carcinomas (BCCs) but a variety of non-surgical options are available. The objective of this study is to evaluate the efficacy and safety of ingenol mebutate 0.05% gel for the treatment of superficial BCCs. We accepted twenty patients with superficial BCCs on the body and we treated them once daily for two consecutive days with ingenol mebutate 0.05% gel. We examined the lesions at the screening visit and after four days from the gel application to describe the local skin reaction due to the therapy. Then we followed the patients after two and six months from the first visit. All the lesions were clinically and dermoscopically documented with a digital camera and we used the LSR (local skin reaction) grading scale based on a 0-4 numerical index of severity with specific clinical parameters and a characteristic photographic image for each rating, to assess the local side effects related to the therapy.