Influence of Negative Pressure and Duration on Skin Thickness in Scar Healing

Negative pressure has been utilized in medical practice, exemplified by methods like cupping therapy. This study aimed to determine the effect of pressure and time duration of cupping therapy on the stratum corneum (SC) and deeper epidermis layer (ED) thickness. Three volunteer participants with healthy palms and no scars or wounds were allocated. Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) records the thickness of skin layers using 105 mmHg and 145 mmHg negative pressure with 5 and 10 minutes duration. We analyzed the paired T-test for the SC thickness changes before and after cupping therapy. We found that there is a significant increase in SC with negative pressure 105 mmHg and 5 minutes duration (0.032 ± 0.005 to 0.036 ± 0.005, P < 0.05), and with negative pressure 145 mmHg and 10 minutes duration (0.037 ± 0.005 to 0.038 ± 0.005, P < 0.05). This indicates that cupping therapy has a discernible impact on the thickness of SC.