PRURITUS ANI AND/OR PRURITUS VULVAE: Its Treatment with Coparaffinate Ointment

Pruritus ani and/or pruritus vulvae is a common disease which frequently taxes the therapeutic ingenuity of the physician. Patients are frequently annoyed to the point of exasperation by the intolerable itching, which results in loss of sleep, nervousness, irritability and loss of efficiency. The prognosis is often unfavorable, and recurrences are frequent.The causes are numerous, and many times complex, and fall within the separate fields of internal medicine, gynecology, proctology, neurology and dermatology. However, almost invariably these patients possess symptomatic manifestations that bring them under the care of a dermatologist.Against a background of rather unsatisfactory therapeutic results in many cases, there came to our notice in 1943 a preparation, coparaffinate ointment (ointment iso-par coparaffinate®), for which were claimed a number of properties which would, if satisfactorily demonstrated, counteract the objective and subjective symptoms in many cases of pruritus ani and, perhaps, of pruritus vulvae.The active ingredients of