Natural Treatment for Keloid Scars

Keloids are a fairly common problem that are often discussed on this forum and have generated quite a few potential treatments.

In the following study the potential usefullness of vitamin D3 and quercetin are discussed in relationship to keloids. Quercetin is a commonly available supplement and vitamin d even more so. Both have very good safety profiles at a minimum and are relatively inexpensive to buy. Both supplements also are known to have many other health benefits, while being vitamin d deficient is known to have bad effects on human health.

It is fairly well established now that the majority of people have insufficient levels of 25 OH d which is the serum test for vitamin d. The reference range for vitamin d or 25 OH d is 30~100 ng/ml. Winter time only tends to worsen the deficiency because of the lack of effective UVB exposure combined with the increased atmosphere distance that the sun's rays have to pass through during our winter's in the USA. All good reasons to check with your doctor to see if including or increasing vitamin d is something healthful for you to try. Remember that age also plays a factor in our bodies ability to convert uvb rays from the sun into vitamin d in our skin. As we age, this ability diminishes and is just one more reason to consider supplementing. If you are insufficient (below 30 ng/ml) or deficient (below 20 ng/ml) and have keloids, maybe your body is trying to tell you something!

If you have keloids that have not responded to other treatments or have not responded well or just keep coming back, then it might be worth discussing this study with your doctor to see if vitamin d might be worth trying with or without quercetin. At a minimum your doctor may recommend getting closer to the top of the reference range than the bottom, at least while actively trying to see if vitamin D can improve your keloids.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4883603/

Here is an abstract from 2011 that also suggests that vitamin d may be useful when it comes to keloids:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21070203

Here is a full study from 2015 that also points to vitamin D as potentially being useful for keloids.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4494495/

Art

I have experience with many remedies including apple cider vinegar which made one keloid considerably worse so tread carefully!

Like many reading these comments I've scoured the internet for a solution for years and years. I'm a 39 yr old male and i have 3 bad keloids since my acne-ridden teens. I've had disastrous laser and steroid injections. They can really get you down these itchy unsightly lumps.

After much trial and error I've found something that has really worked for me. It takes patience but my girlfriend is in awe of the transformation in the last 18 months I've been using this method.

The main ingredient is MSM, taken internally. This is in my opinion the miracle drug we've all been waiting for. Take 2/3000 mg a day with vitamin to aid its effectiveness. I think this alone is responsible for about 70% of the shrinkage but I mix up a home made(not inexpensive but cheaper than a lot of the scam creams out there on the internet) cream that I think makes a difference too and really helps with the itchiness.

I don't have exact measures as i apply this quite liberally to the surrounding areas too as it makes your skin feel good and helps a lot of the teeny white mini keloids I have disappear too.

It's basically one half quality aloe vera gel and one half moo goo msm cream(moo goo are an Australian company, it's widely available here in Ireland) with a few drops of tea tree, lavender and calendula oils. I don't always have all five ingredients but for some reason i feel it works better if you mix it up a bit, two weeks of tea tree, two weeks of lavender and calendula. There's no fixed method and all ingredients are good for your skin in general, especially if you're prone to acne and scarring. It is i feel good to have the aloe vera and msm to dilute the oils though and they can be a bit harsh on their own in my experience and the msm, I've read, helps the oils permeate the outer scar tissue to get to problem inside.

All this said I'm not sure exactly how much the cream really shrinks the scar. It really really eases the itching and puts the scars to the back of my mind so to me it's a very important part of my daily routine now. As much so as my morning cup of coffee(which probably doesn't help the keloids! ). You get to crave that soothing lotion and it has improved the surrounding areas no end.

The one thing I'm 100% certain shrinks keloid scars is msm taken internally. Give a few months. It's not going to happen overnight but within 3 months i think you'll notice that to touch the scars feel different and are noticeably starting to break down. It has changed my life to know that the scars are slowly improving rather than endlessly searching and going through the depression after another failed attempt at improving them. It works! And it's not crazy expensive.

Give it a go! Good luck, David

Keloid Growths

Periodically, I get small, viral bumps on my neck that appear to be made worse from shaving with a razor. Some of these bumps develop into small, keloid-type growths. Over a period of years, and by trial and error, I have found tincture of myrhh to be very effective in getting rid of the bumps. Also, tea tree oil appears to be somewhat effective, but not as effective as myrhh. Note that the myrhh needs to be in tincture form. Myrhh oil does not work as well. Put the tincture directly on the bumps. They will dry up in a week or so.

I burned my hand by taking a pan out of the oven and I had a keloid by the same area. Well, I apply it directly to both areas and cover with a bandage before bedtime every night and within a week or 2 I saw it disappear. I also applied it to my keloid scar after surgery. It does wonders. I thank God. God is good.

Borax for keloid - I have suffered with a keloid on my ear lobe for 20 years. I have had injections and three surgeries it always comes back. Had radiation.iI came back one year later.I tried Apple Cider Vinegar, would not shake it. Finally I tried a borax paste... borax and water mixed and applied it at night. I left it on.about a few days. It started hurting and shrinking. It shrunk from the inside lobe and is soft, not hard. Almost gone after six months.

I have applied Apple Cider Vinegar to my earlobe piercing where my keloid is located it is very small but noticeable. I apply Apple Cider Vinegar undiluted day and night for a 2-3 weeks my ear has scabbed but the keloid seem to be of no reduction in size. My ear has scarred over anda dark and very ugly looking.

Someone help please???

Try sea salt for keloid scars. I had a huge scar tissue on my finger. Two days and it was gone. No harm is trying it. Grind the sea salt to a fine paste, add little water and put it on the scar or keloid over night. You can use gauze to hold it in place. Few nights and you will see the difference. Hope it works but as I said, no harm in trying.

In reply to Mkm (India),

Please look into vitamin D as it relates to keloids. Studies are scant at best, but they do seem to suggest that vitamin D may be beneficial. Vitamin D has a very good safety profile and may have other health benefits. Most people are low on serum 25 OH d, so this would be worth discussing with your doctor. In general keloids are known to have relatively low levels of the vitamin D receptor.

Art

I have been using ACV on a keloid scar that formed 13 years ago after surgery. I had no idea it could be removed until reading the comments on this site.

It was about 4 inches long and a good inch wide, very thick and lumpy. After more than a year of applying ACV on a cotton ball to it over night, it is nearly gone.

At times the ACV irritated my skin. In that case, I let up at night and dabbed ACV on it 3-5 times during the day. A scab would form that would exfoliate off in the shower. The cycle repeated until the scar got smaller and smaller. My skin was more irritated from the tape holding the cotton ball than from the ACV.

I waited this long to post because I feared the scar would somehow reappear. Happy to say, it is 90% gone.

I tried silicon sheets, over the counter scar treatments, and nothing was effective. ACV works, but you must be diligent in applying it every night or daily. I would have preferred something that worked quicker, but after living with the scar for 13 years, what was one more year.

Some people try to "burn" off the keloid with ACV or other acidic pastes, but I think that is a bad idea. I would not recommend ACV for the removal of any keloid, ever. Let me tell you why.

As someone who has keloids and hypertrophic scars (there's a difference, and I have both.), I have studied the formation and treatment of these scars down to the sciences and protein signals that cause them.

Keloids are formed because your body is responding to inflammation. When you are damaged, your body tries to heal. Unfortunately for us keloided folks, our bodies don't know when to STOP healing. Our bodies keep sending out an inflammatory protein even after we're already healed, which is what makes the fibrous, raised, discolored scar tissue.

When you "burn" off your keloid with ACV or something similar, you are re-wounding yourself. Your body will sense the wound and send the signals out to heal. Sure, the keloid may disappear for some time, but there is a huge, HUGE chance that it will return (and probably be bigger than the first time). Think about it: your body over-responds to a wound by forming a keloid. If you try to remove the keloid by creating another wound for your body to heal, a new keloid will form. It has like a 93% chance of reforming.

Those shots that you receive in the keloid are corticosteroids. They are extremely anti-inflammatory. When the doctors give you those, they are essentially trying to send anti-inflammatory signals into the scar so that it will stop putting out that inflammatory protein that keeps telling your body that more tissue is needed.

Radiation is also done because it has the ability to disrupt this inflammatory protein. Believe it or not, the protein responsible for keloids is one of the same proteins that causes tumor growth in cancer--the NF-KB protein. Keloids ARE NOT cancer, but that's why cancer treatments (like radiation) are sometimes done for keloids. That doesn't make them ideal options, though.

I have treated my scars with the use of Serrapeptase. It is an enzyme that I order off Amazon and take by mouth. It eats fibrous, dead tissue from the inside out. I've been taking it for around 7 months, and my keloids are flatter and more blended in to my shoulder. My shoulder keloids are 15 years old, and this is the only thing I do to treat them.

My hypertrophic scars on my abdomen are only around 6 months old. I am currently using silicone gel and/or sheets to treat them (as well as the serrapeptase enzyme, obviously). I've noticed that they are flatter when I eat a high anti-inflammatory diet (lots of fruits and vegetables) and take anti-inflammatory supplements (turmeric, for example.)

A highly anti-inflammatory diet, serrapeptase (and possibly natokinase. It also eats fibrous/dead tissue, but don't take it if you're allergic to soy. I am allergic to soy, so I cannot take this enzyme.), silicone treatments, and/or rosehip oil/lavender oil/helichrysum oil/quercitin. Be soothing, not damaging. Good luck.

I have struggled with keloids for years. They started when I was 14 and I am 28 now. I have them on my shoulders and small ones on my chest. I recently started to use a topical garlic ointment for the past week and noticed they are getting flatter. They are also less itchy. I am going to continue using this process and hopefully they will continue to go down. It's such a struggle dealing with these, it burdens my heart.

Hi All!

I was diagnosed by with a keloid cyst earlier this year and advised by the doctor that the only solution was surgery and/or steroid injections neither of which I was interested in. I had tried all kinds of home remedies including castor oil, hot and cold compresses, apple cider vinegar, various homeopathic creams, and many other recommendations, none of which were of any benefit in my situation. In short, I did my own research and came across Sea Kelp Iodine supplement after realizing that I (like many others) am likely iodine deficient. Within about 3 days of taking the supplement, the cyst was almost completely flat!

Fast-forward approximately two months after, and unfortunately, the bump has become inflamed again. I believe this is due to a significant increase in sugar intake which I normally do not consume which resulted in a loss of effectiveness of the iodine. I have continued to take the iodine supplement daily and am hopeful it will flatten once again.

Despite my cyst having returned, I am confident this supplement is not only great for cysts, but is also imperative for ones overall health. I hope this post helps someone else and perhaps someone can share their experience with curing a cyst such as mine that returned under similar circumstances.

CASTOR OIL + TEA TREE OIL + HEAT PACK 2X DAILY

I used 100% organic, hexane free castor oil (in a brown glass bottle) along with 100% pure tea tree oil and covered the keloid with a heat pack (white rice in a tube sock - heated in the microwave) twice daily. It took nearly a month of this consistent regimen for the small keloid on my thigh to disappear. It is possible, friends! :)

https://www.earthclinic.com/remedies/diy-garlic-oil.html

if you still need to make your own garlic oil, quick recipe at bottom of post

Hello, For the past 2 weeks I've been looking for help to get rid of multiple keloids on my ears due to piercing. I specially want to get rid of one that is the size of a pea, it's really uncomfortable to have it I always have to wear my hair down when I go out so people won't see it. I've had it for over a year in half; at first it started small. I didn't put to much in to it because I had one before and it went away by putting pressure on it using an earring so I thought the same would happen but it didn't. After I let my other piercings close that's when the other keloids appeared. Searching online I found your page and I read others experiences with the apple cider vinegar so I have been trying it for 3 days now. Somehow, the pea sized keloid started at first to turn purple-ish, then it scabbed and I peeled it off. I don't know if I did wrong because some type of pus comes out. I don't know what to do, please help.

I tried it once by leaving it overnight on my skin with cotton wool and it darkened my skin. I will try again by pressing it to my skin for some minutes every night. Hope this works.

I had keloid scar, after I tried piercing my ear, I've used raw ACV for d past 1week I could tell it has done well, I hope it goes n never return forever

Home Remedy for Keloids:

I wish I had a before and after photo. They were SOOOO Big and painful and itched so bad. After about six months this is what I have found to work.

Massage. If I take a glass bottle and massage them for about 5 minutes they are noticably smaller. Then I take Lavender and or Frankincense essential oil and pour directly on it. I also take a body brush and brush it daily for a few weeks. They stay pretty flat. I was amazed at how well it worked after the first application. I only do it a few times a week.

I ran out of oil waiting for it in the mail and I tried turpentine instead and it stings in one area but it's flatter and smaller like a dent in it after about 2 minutes. Like it was burned away. So essential oils Lavender, Frankincense and Turpentine seem to be effective. Also a friend share that if you use lavender there is no scarring and sure enough one scabbed over and is back to normal one the scab fell off.

I would also like to mention that where I picked the scab in the first place created Keloids, where I didn't pick the scabs and let them heal or didn't let the water wash the scab away the skin looks normal. So I know now what to do! Don't pick the scab and cover with Lavender.

People that have keloids should avoid foods and drinks that are acid, sour vinegar, limes, etc, excess salt, and excess sugar red meat. These things make keloids itch and grow much larger. Take vitamins E, C, D , CQ1O LIQUID, KRILL OIL, VIT B COMPLEX if care is taken the darkness will reduce and many times the color will get to be the color of your skin and keloid will become more flat overtime.

I also have keloids and for many years the itching was terrible. I got surgery on one which made it four times bigger. Then I started getting painful injections on another one, which did not help. I got four injections in total and stopped since I changed my diet. That is what made a difference. Also staying hydrated. I will start painting it with iodine. Good luck.

I have a keloid on my cartilage from an ear piercing. It is about the size a bean. I have been using ACV for about a month. Sometimes I forget to use it and I only do it at night. It scabs over and It even gave me a black spot on it. It scabs over and it goes away. It creates holes in the places that I have my cotton ball on the most but, I think it is working. It hasn't gone down much (I'm not too consistent) but it has flattened and changed shaped which makes me believe if I continue it will flatten even better. I'm white so my skin seems to have turned a bit redder but it's not too bad. I cover my ear everyday anyways and if it flattens more I don't care if there is a red spot. Hope this helps someone figure out what to do. Goodluck and post your story even if the reply is late because if you found this someone else will too!! Like me!!

Keloids - often respond well to treatment topically with comfrey dalve or Complete Tissue Salve (contains Comfrey)

If you cannot find either of these email me at myronweaver2(at)gmail. com and I will suggest a source.

I help treat burns and serious wounds outside of the hospital whenever possible and we were working on a 2 yr old who had been burned over 30% of his body. When he was released from the hospital, the concern was the serious keloids he had that covered his whole back. These would not stretch as he grew. I have a huge bed of comfrey so I blended comfrey root with olive oil and mixed it with another salve and applied it daily to his back and his keloids nearly disappeared over a few months of time. We were very grateful.

Since our family takes comfrey internally (though FDA warns against it) we have had good success with a 6 inch by 2 inch keloid shrinking to an almost flat surface. My husband was drinking comfrey green smoothies for some intestinal trouble he was having and one day he noticed, to his amazement that his keloid on his arm was 50% gone.

Comfrey is a skin miracle worker.

We had a friend who had serious scarring in his throat from a tracheotomy site. It affected his voice big time. On hearing what comfrey could do he began drinking green smoothies of comfrey.

In one week he told us that his voice was 50% better and the scarring was going away.

I've had a massive amount of keloids (genetic) since I was 8 years old. I'm 17 now and all the doctor has done is given me painful steroid injections. So far my own naturally made concoction has sort of helped but only with making them lighter, not making them go away. So I'm going to try ACV along with my spray (pure fresh lemon juice, grape seed oil, lavender essential oil, frankincense essential oil, tea tree oil, fresh aloe gel, and olive oil) I'll definitely keep all of you up to date on how it's working and what the effects may be etc.

Hi, I recommend you try Potassium Iodine.. It is heaven sent!! I have been on it for 2 weeks now and the results have been amazing. I can literally see the scars receding and flattening right before my very eyes!! The one thing about Keloid scars that most people don't understand is- they formed because the area at some point became infected. The Keloid forms as a result of our bodies trying to protect itself- thus trapping the infection in place. Iodide/Iodine (google it) not only makes the skin tissue regenerate but it cures the infection altogether!! I recommend supplementing with Lugol's iodine and applying Potassium directly on the scars twice a day. This double threat will make sure that you are attacking the infection both internally and externally! Another good thing about it is that onece the Keloid is gone.. It will never come back.. How good is that?!?! ? Good luck!!