An interventional study of fractional C02 laser and Topical tacrolimus 0.1% ointment in Nail Psoriasis, sponsored by Cairo University. Not yet recruiting. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-11-05.
Sponsored by Cairo University · Not applicable, Interventional, and Treatment
Nail psoriasis can change how your nails look and cause pain, making everyday activities uncomfortable and affecting your confidence. Treatments include creams or ointments, injections, medicines that work throughout the body, and laser therapy. The choice depends on your age, symptoms, overall health, preferences, and possible side effects.
Steroid injections can help, but they may be painful and can cause bruising under the nail or thinning of the skin around the injection site. Fractional CO2 laser creates tiny channels in the nail to help medicines applied to it pass through more easily. Studies have reported improvement with laser treatment, although adding certain ointments has not always worked better than laser alone.
Tacrolimus 0.1% ointment has also shown promising results. The proposed study aims to find out whether combining this ointment with fractional CO2 laser works better than using the ointment alone.
Nail psoriasis is a common finding in psoriatic patients with a negative impact on the quality of life. The cosmetic disfigurement leads to social embarrassment and the associated pain may interfere with the daily physical activities1.2.
Therapeutic options for nail psoriasis include topical, intralesional, systemic agents, and laser treatment. The choice of treatments depends on multiple factors, including the age, the burden of the disease, accompanying diseases, individual preferences, and the risks of treatment 3.
Intramatricial corticosteroid injection has been used for many years in nail psoriasis with good results; the steroid of choice is triamcinolone acetonide despite its efficacy, the intralesional injection can be quite painful and pain management methods may be required before treatment. It can also be associated with adverse effects, such as subungual hematoma formation and injection site atrophy 4,5.
Ablative fractional CO2 laser (FCL) has been commonly used for the treatment of nail diseases owing to its ability to create microchannels to enhance drug permeation and assist the transungual delivery of topically applied drugs suggesting that it might be useful in the treatment of nail psoriasis6,7.
Fractional CO2 laser combined with topical methotrexate on one side and topical (calcipotriol/betamethasone) on the other side in nail psoriasis and showed marked clinical improvement with both regimens 8.
Another study was done to compare fractional CO2 laser versus fractional CO2 laser plus betamethasone/calcipotriol ointment in treatment of nail psoriasis.
Topical vitamin D derivatives with corticosteroids show improvement in nail psoriasis in the combined therapy group. This improvement was not superior to fractional CO2 laser monotherapy 9.
Tacrolimus 0.1% ointment has been studed in the treatment of nail psoriasis with a good clinical response 10.
To the best of our knowledge, no studies were found to compare efficacy of fractional CO2 laser combined with topical tacrolimus 0.1% in the treatment of nail psoriasis.
2,028 studies on the registry are indexed under Psoriasis; 275 are open to participants now.
This study's planned enrollment of 29 is below the median of 75 across 1,565 interventional studies indexed under Psoriasis.
Browse Psoriasis studies →Cairo University is the lead sponsor of 4,941 studies on the registry; 1,458 are open to participants now.
Of its 37 completed or terminated interventional studies of FDA-regulated products, 5 (14%) have results posted.
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Go through the criteria one by one — yes, no or not sure — and take the list to your doctor or the study team. Kept in this browser only.
Exclusion Criteria:
one finger nail receiving fractional carbon dioxide laser followed by topical tacrolimus
Device: fractional C02 laser
one similar fingernail on the opposite hand receiving only topical tacrolimus 0.1
Drug: Topical tacrolimus 0.1% ointment
three sessions of fractional CO2 laser with 4-week intervals in addition to topical tacrolimus 0.1% ointment, applied right after the treatment and in between sessions. The DEKA fractional CO2 laser will be used with the following parameters: 20 W, 2000-ms dwell time, 5 stacks, and 500-mm spacing.
topical tacrolimus oint 0.1% will be applied to the fingernail daily for 3 months
the improvement of the Target Nail Psoriasis Severity Index (tNAPSI) score before and after treatment
Comparison of the improvement in each group individually and between both groups
Time frame: 3 months
patients satisfaction
Patient satisfaction at the end of the study by grading as excellent, very good, good, below average, or poor.
Time frame: 3 months
No study locations are listed for this record.
Start is estimated for Nov 2026; primary completion for Feb 2027, 3 months later.
Of 115 non-industry interventional studies with no phase under Psoriasis, half reached primary completion within 21 months of starting (the median), counting those still running; a quarter within 10 and three quarters within 41. This study's planned 3 months is below that.
Counting every sponsor, half of 134 studies reached it within 19 months; a quarter within 8 and three quarters within 38.
How these figures are worked out, and which studies are left out of them.
From the registry record's own update history. This site started tracking changes on Sep 25, 2026; for anything earlier, see the record history on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
This study is not yet recruiting, as verified in Nov 2026. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.
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Studies of the drug tested here: Tacrolimus