Method and apparatus for skin absorption enhancement and transdermal drug delivery

A method of transdermal drug delivery to be provided to a patient's skin, comprising:

• performing a dermabrasion treatment of the patient's skin so as to lower a skin impedance to below a first value;
• and
• providing, by way of a probe that comprises a flexible tape, a plurality of cavities, and a substance holding material provided in each of the cavities and which holds a drug to be delivered to the patient's skin, at least one burst of electrical pulses to the patient's skin that has been dermabrasion treated;
• and
• controlling an amount of current to be applied to the patient's skin in the at least one burst of electrical pulses,
• wherein the plurality of cavities comprises a first set of even-numbered cavities and a second set of odd-numbered cavities interleaved with each other, and
• wherein a first set of the electrical pulses in the at least one burst of electrical pulses is applied only to the first set of even-numbered cavities and wherein a second set of the electrical pulses in the at least one burst of electrical pulses is applied only to the second set of odd-numbered cavities.

A method for performing transdermal drug delivery to a patient's skin, comprising:

• providing, by way of a probe, a plurality of bursts of electronic pulses to the patient's skin at a same time a drug is applied to the patient's skin;
• and
• in between the providing of the plurality of bursts of electronic pulses to the patient's skin, applying either alternate-polarity square pulses or sinusoidal pulses to the patient's skin,
• wherein the probe includes a flexible tape with a plurality of cavities in which a substance holding material is disposed in each of the cavities, the substance holding material holding the drug to be applied to the patient's skin,
• wherein the bursts of electronic pulses are provided in sequential order to a plurality of electronic pulse signal lines respectively provided for an electrode array disposed on the probe,
• wherein the bursts of electronic pulses are provided by way of a plurality of pulse generators respectively connected to the plurality of electronic pulse signal lines in which the plurality of pulse generators includes a first set of pulse generators connected to a first set of the plurality of cavities that are not directly adjacent to each other, and a second set of the plurality of cavities that are not directly adjacent to each other, wherein the plurality of pulse generators are selectively turned on and off by way of a processor such that the first set of pulse generators only provides electrical pulses to the first set of the plurality of cavities and the second set of pulse generators only provides electrical pulses to the second set of the plurality of cavities.