Topical tacrolimus has a limited direct effect on ultraviolet B-irradiated keratinocytes: implications for its photocarcinogenic potential.

BACKGROUND

Topical tacrolimus has shown remarkable clinical efficacy in treating many dermatoses. Combining ultraviolet (UV) B and tacrolimus is an intriguing therapeutic regimen, especially for treatment of vitiligo, for which combination therapy may show greater clinical efficacy than topical tacrolimus alone. The photocarcinogenic potential of such a regimen is unclear, and conflicting results have been reported by different investigators.

AIM: To clarify this important clinical issue, we investigated the effects of tacrolimus on UVB-irradiated cultured keratinocytes in terms of apoptosis, differentiation, cell-cycle regulation and DNA damage.

METHODS

Cultured keratinocytes were treated with tacrolimus before and after UVB irradiation and the various cellular physiological changes were evaluated using trypan blue exclusion, terminal dUTP nick-end labelling, flow cytometry and Western blotting analyses.

RESULTS

Our results showed that treatment of tacrolimus before or after UVB irradiation had no significant effects on cultured keratinocytes in terms of cell apoptosis, transglutaminase-1, involucrin expression, cell-cycle progression and phospho-H(2)AX compared with UVB irradiation alone.

CONCLUSION

The direct effect of tacrolimus on UVB-irradiated keratinocytes is small, suggesting that clinical regimens combining UVB and tacrolimus also have a limited direct effect on healthy skin compared with UVB irradiation alone.