Can microneedling cause cancer?

[Alfred001]

If you're unfamiliar with it, microneedling is a proceedure used for skin rejuvenation (including removing scars) and hair loss. A device is used to create many many tiny needle puncture wounds on the skin or the scalp. It's something htat is becoming increasingly popular, but it seems to me, with my limited knowledge, that there might be some cancer concerns here through two distinct mechanisms:

1) What is described here starting with the header "Dermarolling May Trigger Tumor Formation"

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Skin wounds are not as benign as once thought, and research has found that skin wounds may promote basal cell carcinoma. The link between skin wounds and cancer is even more alarming if you make a wound every day due to dermarolling.

Basal cell carcinoma is a type of skin cancer whose origins are often from the cells of hair follicles, which contain stem cells that differentiate and divide to replace hair after shedding. Tumor formation occurs when the DNA within the follicular cells accumulates errors, causing unregulated cellular division. Follicular stem cells primary function is hair growth, however their functionality also extends to healing skin wounds.

 

2) generation of new hair follicles through stem cells

When used on the scalp, microneedling induces the creation of new hair follicles through stem cell division. From what I understand, cancer can happen when cells start dividing and don't stop when they are supposed to.

The idea behind microneedling is to generate an immense number of stab wounds. For example, there are dermapens that stab with 35 needles simultaneously and people are supposed to move these around their head and cover the whole scalp multiple times, so the numbers are extraordinarily large.

Seems to me with so much stem cell division, isn't there a risk of something going south? Is that a plausible scenario?

[Strange]

7 minutes ago, Alfred001 said:

1) What is described here starting with the header "Dermarolling May Trigger Tumor Formation"

I would be cautious about opinions of someone selling their own alternative skin care products. 

[Carrock]

20 minutes ago, Alfred001 said:

2) generation of new hair follicles through stem cells

When used on the scalp, microneedling induces the creation of new hair follicles through stem cell division.

I'd be very surprised if there was evidence for this.

Reference please.

[Alfred001]

On 1/24/2020 at 1:44 PM, Carrock said:

I'd be very surprised if there was evidence for this.

Reference please.

I learned about it from a company called Follica which is developing a hair loss treatment. Here's an article summarizing the results they announced.

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The company’s proprietary treatment is designed to induce an embryonic window via a device with optimized parameters to initiate hair follicle neogenesis, the formation of new hair follicles from epithelial (skin) stem cells.

I don't know whether there's independent research that found hair follicle neogenesis, but there is research showing microneedling induces hair growth in balding men.

[StringJunky]

17 minutes ago, Alfred001 said:

I learned about it from a company called Follica which is developing a hair loss treatment. Here's an article summarizing the results they announced.

I don't know whether there's independent research that found hair follicle neogenesis, but there is research showing microneedling induces hair growth in balding men.

From what I've read, the microneedling facilitates the absorption of topical treatments, which are actually doing the work.

Edited January 26, 2020 by StringJunky

[Alfred001]

13 hours ago, StringJunky said:

From what I've read, the microneedling facilitates the absorption of topical treatments, which are actually doing the work.

I think that was just one of the speculated hypotheses, I don't think the mechanism of action was known, but now Follica says microneedling induces the generation of new hair follicles through stem cell division.

My concerns are the ones outlined in this video and I'm wondering if anyone is knowledgeable enough on this topic to tell me whether this is a realistic concern, given stem cell division in generation of new hair follicles

 

[StringJunky]

3 hours ago, Alfred001 said:

I think that was just one of the speculated hypotheses, I don't think the mechanism of action was known, but now Follica says microneedling induces the generation of new hair follicles through stem cell division.

My concerns are the ones outlined in this video and I'm wondering if anyone is knowledgeable enough on this topic to tell me whether this is a realistic concern, given stem cell division in generation of new hair follicles

 

In conjunction with topical applications it is documented, although not conclusive:

Quote

Microneedling is a minimally invasive dermatological procedure in which fine needles are rolled over the skin to puncture the stratum corneum. This therapy is used to induce collagen formation, neovascularization and growth factor production of treated areas. It has been used in a wide range of dermatologic conditions, including androgenetic alopecia (AGA) and alopecia areata, among others. While there are a limited number of studies examining this therapy in the use of hair loss, microneedling has been successfully paired with other hair growth promoting therapies, such as minoxidil, platelet-rich plasma and topical steroids, and shown to stimulate hair follicle growth. It is thought that microneedling facilitates penetration of such first-line medications, and this is one mechanism by which it promotes hair growth. To date, the area most studied and with the most success has been microneedling treatment of AGA. While the current evidence does not allow one to conclude superiority of microneedling over existing standard therapies for hair loss, microneedling shows some promise in improving hair growth, especially in combination with existing techniques. This review summarizes the current literature regarding microneedling in the treatment of alopecia and calls for further studies to define a standard treatment protocol.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29194786