The management of scarring continues to be significant in health care due to their ubiquity and impact on daily life. Scars include immature, mature, atrophic, hypertrophic, and keloid scars, with hypertrophic and keloid scars commonly being targeted for therapeutic interventions. Hypertrophic and keloid scars have dysregulated wound healing phases, involving higher levels of inflammatory markers, such as TGF-β, PDGF, VEGF, as well as increased type 1 collagen. Current treatments for hypertrophic scarring and keloid scars include pressure garments, corticosteroids, laser therapy, scar excision, and radiation. The next steps in therapy involve minimizing scars and eventually eliminating scars by tissue regeneration; current research is exploring the inhibition of Yes-associated protein and harnessing TGF-β3 to support tissue regeneration over scarring in humans.
scars; scar prevention; skin regeneration