When is steroid injection into the skin recommended for central centrifugal cicatricial alopecia?

Central centrifugal cicatricial alopecia can involve inflammation that damages hair follicles and leads to scarring. A dermatologist may consider intralesional steroid injections when the scalp appears active, with symptoms such as tenderness, itching, burning, redness, or continuing loss, and when targeted treatment is appropriate.

The medicine is placed into selected scalp areas rather than applied broadly. Its aim is to calm inflammation and help limit further follicle injury; it cannot reliably restore follicles that have already been replaced by scar tissue. The clinician balances treatment intensity with the possibility of temporary soreness, skin thinning, or a lighter patch.

Keep scheduled scalp examinations and report whether tenderness, burning, itching, or hair shedding changes. Handle the scalp gently, avoid tight hairstyles and chemical or heat practices that irritate it, and use any prescribed scalp treatment exactly as directed. Tell the clinician about infections, medicines, pregnancy, and previous steroid-related skin changes.

Arrange prompt assessment for rapidly expanding thinning, increasing scalp pain, pus, crusting, marked redness, or fever. Contact the clinic if an injection site develops a persistent hollow, pronounced colour change, or worsening tenderness.

Ask how the clinician will identify active disease, what the injection is intended to achieve, how scarring affects regrowth, which scalp practices to avoid, and when the next activity check is needed.