Burn survivors frequently face a distressing secondary complication known as hypertrophic scarring, where the skin heals in bumpy, uneven, and raised bulges. This condition occurs when collagen proliferates excessively as a wound heals, causing newly formed tissue to swell outward. Beyond the significant cosmetic impact, these scars often cause persistent pain and intense itching. When they form over joints or flexion areas, the underlying skin can contract and stiffen, severely restricting a patient's range of motion and overall mobility. While current interventions include surgery, compression therapy, and local steroid injections, highly effective preventive measures or targeted drug treatments remain scarce.
A potential breakthrough may now lie in an unexpected quarter. A joint research team from the Eulji University College of Medicine, CHA University, and the Hallym University College of Medicine has discovered that the diabetes medication evogliptin can effectively suppress the development of these hypertrophic scars.
Evogliptin is conventionally used to regulate blood sugar levels by promoting insulin secretion while blocking the release of glucagon. To investigate its dermatological potential, the researchers extracted cells from both hypertrophic scar tissue and normal skin tissue from burn patients, exposing them to evogliptin to analyze subsequent molecular changes.
The experiments revealed that evogliptin directly blocks the primary biological drivers of scar formation. Specifically, it inhibited the overproduction of Type 1 and Type 3 collagen, which cause the aggressive overgrowth of new tissue, alongside fibronectin, a protein that recruits cells to accelerate tissue accumulation.
Furthermore, the research team demonstrated that evogliptin could prevent tissue fibrosis—the pathological process by which skin becomes rigid and hardened—by interrupting the specific cellular signaling pathways that trigger it. Because evogliptin is already widely utilized in clinical practice with an established safety profile, repurposing it for scar management could drastically reduce the immense time and financial costs typically required to develop entirely new pharmaceuticals from scratch.
"This discovery offers a meaningful new alternative in the field of scar treatment," said Professor Kim Jun-beom of the Eulji University College of Medicine. "While severe scarring has a profound, lasting impact on a patient's overall quality of life, our clinical options for effective prevention have long been fundamentally limited."
