[presidentender]

I'm prone to plantar warts, and the only success I've had has been from surgical removal. I have not tried duct tape, though.

Once I went to a podiatrist who injected bleomycin, a chemotherapy drug. My foot hurt for several days and blood blisters formed beneath the warts, but the operation was unsuccessful.

I went to another podiatrist for the same warts and he anesthetized me and removed them with a curette.

Several years later I had a few more show up, and got some of the same anesthetic the second doctor had used, which worked marvelously. Unfortunately I didn't remember which anti-bleeding agent he had used and so I was less able to tell what was going on during my self surgery; ultimately, though, it was effective.

I also had a wart between the third and fourth knuckle of my left hand for many years. I'd pick at it sometimes but it was benign otherwise. One day I noticed that it was gone. The spot where it had been gets dry and flaky moreso than the rest of my hands.

[garciasn]

I’d use prescribed wart medication that would make the wart soft and pliable. I would scrape the skin, exposing what I assume were root-like threads and pull them with tweezers. I’d use iodine to clean the spot and put a bandaid on it. They wouldn’t grow back.

I never tried duct tape and haven’t had warts in decades.

[s1artibartfast]

I have removed several warts in a similar way. I just use a razor to progressively shave them away during my hygiene routine when I trim my nails. After 3-4 times the root of the wart is exposed, "dries", and crumbles away. I imagine it is a simple matter of removing tissue faster than the wart can grow back. I assume this isnt standard practice because most people are scared of cutting themselves and doctors dont do it because multiple visits aren't practical.

[seabass-labrax]

Is the thickness of skin superficial to the blood vessels constant even on the wart area, or has the wart additional skin, making it thicker in that area than usual? Or, a different way of putting that, if you were to follow the normal contour of the skin when shaving the wart down, would you end up drawing blood?

[denton-scratch]

Yes, in my experience. Warts form in the epithelium, and are usually covered by a layer of dead skin cells. I guess they hijack a blood supply from lower layers of the dermis, because black dots on the surface of the wart are blood vessels (the epithelium doesn't normally have blood vessels).

For clarity, the wart is skin. Veruccas are flat because you walk on them; otherwise they are identical to warts on your hands, which do project past the surrounding skin.

[seabass-labrax]

Thanks for responding! Maybe I have had a verruca on my thumb, then: for many years I had a dark bump on the pad of my thumb, which was painful to touch, and then it appeared to 'sink' into the skin. I don't suppose there is any reason why one's (healthy) skin cells wouldn't cover over the wart given an opportunity, and maybe the continual pressure on my thumb gave it just that.

[s1artibartfast]

>I don't suppose there is any reason why one's (healthy) skin cells wouldn't cover over the wart given an opportunity, and maybe the continual pressure on my thumb gave it just that.

I suspect what you were seeing was not it sinking in, but reducing in diameter, as your immune system consumed viral cells. Imagine the cross section of a cone decreasing as it is pushed out of a surface.

[denton-scratch]

I'm not a doctor.

1. Veruccas are warts on the soles of the feet. If it's on your hand, it's a wart.

2. Warts are normally skin-coloured, or greyish, or yellowish.

See a doctor.

[Edit] I think some people refer to some kinds of mole as a "wart". If your lesion is dark, then maybe it's no kind of wart at all, but a mole, i.e. a melanoma.

[s1artibartfast]

A wart itself protrudes above skin level and extends below normal skin level.

They have much more visualization than adjacent tissue, and you can see this in many medical diagrams.

When I cut, I do it horizontally in layers, until blood just starts to bead from cut vessels. In my experience, the wart will always start to bleed before the adjacent healthy tissue. The vessels naturally die back from the new surface, and the process can be repeated in a few days.

[seabass-labrax]

> The vessels naturally die back from the new surface, and the process can be repeated in a few days.

Interesting; are these (presumably clotted) blood vessels the threads that another comment mentioned? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40417294

[s1artibartfast]

You can see a digram of the blood supply here [1]. If you look at this paper, you will find several warts with black dots. Those are blood vessels which have reached the surface.[2]

https://sanderspodiatry.com.au/blog/2021/02/23/plantar-warts...

https://www.dovepress.com/dermoscopy-features-of-cutaneous-w...