About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Treatments and drugs
By Mayo Clinic staffWarts often go away without treatment. But even if your warts have disappeared or have been removed, you can still harbor HPV and may transmit the virus to others.
Medications
Medications to eliminate warts are typically applied directly to the lesion and usually take many applications before they are successful. Examples include:
- Salicylic acid. Over-the-counter treatments that contain salicylic acid work by removing layers of a wart a little bit at a time. Don't use these products for genital warts, as they will cause severe irritation.
- Imiquimod (Aldara, Zyclara). This prescription cream may enhance your immune system's ability to fight HPV.
- Podofilox (Condylox). Another type of prescription cream, podofilox works by destroying genital wart tissue.
- Trichloroacetic acid. This chemical treatment burns off genital warts.
Surgical and other procedures
If medications don't work, your doctor may suggest one of the following procedures, which physically remove warts by:
- Freezing with liquid nitrogen (cryotherapy)
- Electrocautery, which uses an electrical current to burn off warts or lesions
- Surgical removal
- Laser surgery
- Douglas JM. Papillomavirus. In: Goldman L, et al. Cecil Medicine. 23rd ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: Saunders Elsevier; 2008. http://www.mdconsult.com/books/page.do?eid=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-2805-5..50401-8&isbn=978-1-4160-2805-5&sid=1100799163&type=bookPage§ionEid=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-2805-5..50401-8--cesec10&uniqId=230895620-4#4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-2805-5..50401-8--cesec10. Accessed Jan. 3, 2011.
- Habif TP. Warts. In: Habif TP. Clinical Dermatology: A Color Guide to Diagnosis and Therapy. 5th ed. Edinburgh, U.K.; New York, N.Y.: Mosby Elsevier; 2010. http://www.mdconsult.com/books/page.do?eid=4-u1.0-B978-0-7234-3541-9..00021-3&isbn=978-0-7234-3541-9&sid=1100799163&type=bookPage§ionEid=4-u1.0-B978-0-7234-3541-9..00021-3--s0015&uniqId=230895620-4#4-u1.0-B978-0-7234-3541-9..00021-3--s0015. Accessed Jan. 3, 2011.
- Reichman R. Clinical presentation and diagnosis of human papillomavirus infections. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed Jan. 3, 2011.
- Genital HPV infection: Fact sheet. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. http://www.cdc.gov/std/HPV/STDFact-HPV.htm. Accessed Jan. 3, 2011.
- Molpus KL, et al. Gynecologic cancers. In: Goldman L, et al. Cecil Medicine. 23rd ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: Saunders Elsevier; 2008. http://www.mdconsult.com/books/page.do?eid=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-2805-5..50214-7--cesec29&isbn=978-1-4160-2805-5&sid=1101118090&type=bookPage§ionEid=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-2805-5..50214-7--cesec40&uniqId=230973572-4#4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-2805-5..50214-7--cesec40. Accessed Jan. 4, 2011.
- Goldstein BG, et al. Cutaneous warts. http://uptodate.com.home/index.html. Accessed Jan. 4, 2011.
- Warts. American Academy of Dermatology. http://aad.org/publications/pamphlets/common_warts.html. Accessed Jan. 4, 2011.
- Breen E, et al. Condylomata acuminata (anogenital warts). http://uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed Jan. 4, 2011.
- Human papillomaviruses and cancer. National Cancer Institute. http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Risk/HPV. Accessed Jan. 4, 2011.
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, et al. Recommendations on the use of quadrivalent human papillomavirus vaccine in males — Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP). MMWR Recommendations and Reports. 2011:60;1705.
Find Mayo Clinic on