PDRN: all 51 Korean products are prescription-only, and the surgical-scar trial missed significance on its main score

Forty-four patients who had open thyroidectomy were randomised to PDRN or an untreated control group (NCT05149118). The treatment group received two injections on days 1 and 2 after surgery, and scars were assessed three months later.

The modified Vancouver Scar Scale came out at 1.619 ± 1.244 for treatment and 2.500 ± 1.540 for control. The direction was as hoped, but p = .059 did not clear the conventional threshold of .05.

Among the subscores, vascularity was significantly lower (0.476 ± 0.512 vs 0.900).

A trial whose main score misses significance cannot be used as evidence that something prevents scarring. There were 44 participants. Hence not established — not that it does nothing, but that this trial did not show it.

And what this trial looked at was surgical scars, not skin ageing.

The Korean drug register lists 51 products with sodium polydeoxyribonucleotide as the active ingredient, all prescription-only (checked 16 September 2026).

That means a doctor's prescription and a procedure. This page does not cover dosing or technique — those are settled in consultation.

Search the Korean functional-cosmetic filing register and several products come up with 'PDRN' in the product name.

A cosmetic you apply and a prescription medicine you inject are different things. A shared name does not make them do the same job, and the evidence on the cosmetic side has nothing to do with the trial on this page.

That applied PDRN does anything resembling the injection is not established. Given the molecule size, the same question arises as with topical collagen.