When it comes to getting rid of warts, it might be tempting to go DIY with home remedies, or reach for the big guns, like surgery or freezing. But before you grab the scalpel or ice spray, there’s a whole range of treatments to consider.
Should you opt for invasive or non-invasive wart removal? What actually works? What’s going to cause the least pain, and what’s going to give you the best shot at getting rid of them for good? Let’s weigh up your options. (Spoiler alert: there’s a winner.)
Invasive techniques for wart removal
Invasive treatments usually involve injections, cutting, laser, acid, or freezing treatments. They tend to come with a bit more baggage, including discomfort, long recovery time, and potential for scarring. For this reason, they’re often used when other non-invasive methods have failed.
Surgical removal
This involves numbing the area with an injection and cutting or scooping the wart out. It’s immediate, but success rates are poor and it comes with very risky trade-offs: there’s discomfort post-surgery, wound care, and a risk of permanent scarring (up to 30%). It’s especially tricky on the soles, where scar tissue can make walking painful. There’s also a high risk of recurrence if the virus lingers in the surrounding tissue. This means that you now have two lumps: a wart AND a scar.
Surgical removal of a wart is generally not recommended.
Laser removal
Another invasive method is medical lasers. Two common types are:
- Pulsed-dye laser (PDL) which heats blood cells in the area to cut off the wart’s blood supply and kill the virus
- CO2 laser which destroys the wart tissue by heating and vaporising the water within the wart cells
Evidence around the efficacy of laser wart removal is somewhat mixed, but some studies have shown laser to be a little more effective (40%-50%) than cryotherapy (38%). However, it can be significantly painful, and you commonly need anaesthetic. The healing can involve open wounds or charred tissue, and you may need to be off your feet for a few days.
Intralesional injections
This approach involved injecting medication into the wart. This might be a chemotherapy drug (bleomycin) that attempts to kill the wart’s viral cells, or immunotherapy, which requires injecting antigens into the wart to stimulate the body’s immune system to attack the virus.
Bleomycin and immunotherapy results vary widely, with cure rates hovering around 60%, depending on factors like the type of wart and the patient’s response to treatment. Like other invasive methods, the injections can be painful, and carry a risk of tissue damage, especially with bleomycin.
Less invasive techniques for wart removal
Non-invasive wart treatments don’t break the skin or require injections. Since they tend to involve a much gentler approach, they are typically the first options for removing warts.
Cryotherapy (freezing)
Liquid nitrogen freezes the wart, causing it to blister and eventually fall off. It comes with a significant sting, often leaves a blister, and you’ll probably need multiple sessions. Cure rates average 38% after many treatments.
Topical salicylic acid
This non-invasive wart removal treatment is available over the counter and is applied to the wart daily. It works by slowly peeling away layers of skin over time. While generally painless, inexpensive, and convenient to use at home, it requires consistent daily application for several weeks. Sometimes up to 12 or more. Results are typically <30%, and it often fails to fully clear warts, particularly more stubborn types like plantar warts.
Home remedies and old wives’ tales
Orange peels, banana peels, raw garlic, apple cider vinegar – it’s been said that rubbing these on your wart will eventually get rid of it. But the research simply doesn’t back these claims up.
Home remedies like these might gain traction due to the fact that many warts resolve by themselves without treatment. (‘I painted my wart with nail polish every day for two weeks and it disappeared! It must work!’) Sure, it’s harmless to try, but these remedies are more myth than medicine.
NON-invasive techniques for wart removal
Swift™ microwave therapy
Here’s where things get exciting. Swift™ is the ONLY non-invasive wart treatment available. It uses microwave energy to heat wart tissue from the inside. This increase in temperature triggers your immune system to fight the virus at that location. The temperature increase is only modest (to about 42-45°C), so it doesn’t cause wounds or blistering. Discomfort is minimal and brief, and there’s no lingering soreness.
Swift™ is more effective than any invasive wart removal methods, with an 83% wart clearance rate at Australian Wart Clinic. And you usually only need 1–3 sessions. No dressings, no downtime. Just walk in, zap, and walk out.
This is the only proven high-efficacy lesion treatment with no downtime and no surrounding tissue damage, so it’s our pick for the best non-invasive wart treatment you can get.
Swift™: our choice for non-invasive wart removal
Choosing the right treatment depends on the type and persistence of the wart, as well as your goals for speed and convenience. While some methods may involve discomfort, the goal isn’t to choose the most painful option you can tolerate. It’s to select a treatment that’s both effective and minimally damaging to healthy skin.
At Australian Wart Clinic, we use Swift™ for its proven efficacy, minimal sessions, and little to no downtime. It’s by far the best wart removal approach.
Think painful treatments are your only option? Think again. Book an appointment at Australian Wart Clinic to see if Swift™ is the right option for your wart treatment.
