Topical steroid – An effective treatment for physiologic phimosis in children

Abstract

Asymptomatic phimosis is normal in young children which self-corrects itself but leads to parental anxiety. Topical steroids lead to correction of this physiologic phimosis avoiding the need of circumcision. Six male children aged between 3 and 14 years presented with asymptomatic tight phimosis present since birth. All the children were advised application of small amount of clobetasol propionate cream at night along with manual retraction during bath. At the end of 2 months, all the children had fully retractable prepuce. By the first visit (2 weeks), all the patients showed at least partial retractability of the prepuce. Till the follow-up period of 6 months, there was no recurrence in any patient. No side effects were observed.

Keywords

• physiologic phymosis
• tight phimosis
• topical steroid