A little research finds a remedy is questionable

Many people have some skin tags, like the one shown above on my neck. Wikipedia says that a skin tag (or archrodon) is a small benign tumor found where areas of skin rub together (or form creases) like the neck, armpit, or groin.

Over at Walmart I saw a package of ProVent skin tag remover. The label said the active ingredient was Thuja Occidentalis – an essential oil present at a homeopathic concentration of 6X. You are supposed to put a few drops of the liquid on the tag every day, and after a few weeks it will be gone. But before I bought it I decided to look up reviews at Amazon (and also Walmart) to see if others found it was effective.

First for comparison I looked up a serious pain relief product -  the Salonpas Lidocaine Pain Relieving Maximum Strength Gel Patch. As shown above, 69% gave it a 5 stars and only 9 % gave it 1 star.

For ProVent the Amazon reviews were relatively poor. As shown above, just 27% gave it 5 stars, but 53% gave it 1 star. At Walmart reviews were even worse – 29% gave it 5 stars but 62% gave it 1 star.

Looking around on Google, I found a dismissive article by Harriet Hall, M.D. on June 18, 2013 at Science Based Medicine about a similar product (with the same active ingredient and concentration) called Tag Away that had been advertised on television.

As shown above, reviews of Tag Away at Amazon were even worse than for ProVent – 19% gave it 5 stars but 56% gave it 1 star.  Back on January 6, 2016 I blogged about how According to Consumer Reports, homeopathy is an emperor with no clothes.

What really works for removing skin tags? The Wikipedia article mentions ligation – tying a string around it to cut off blood flow. Wikipedia also mentions cryosurgery (freezing). At PubMed Central I found an article in  Jay E. Taylor on pages 998 and 999 of Canadian Family Physician for December 2016, titled Just a pinch - Technique for skin tag removal in sensitive areas.