Product Review: Dr. Scholl's Clear Away Plantar Wart Remover

What exactly is a plantar wart? A plantar wart is a wart that appears on the bottom of the foot. Plantar warts have tiny black dots in the middle of them, which make plantar warts so easy to differentiate from other conditions. The black dots are actually small blood vessels. Plantar warts can be hard to get rid of because, while you can see them, the majority of the wart is inside your foot.

Dr. Scholl's Clear Away Plantar Wart Remover is basically little salicylic acid discs that you place over the plantar wart. Included in the box are some cushion pads to place over the disc. In my experience, the cushion pad will fall off and take the disc with it. I found it works better if you do not use the cushioning pads. The cushioning pads may be unnecessary anyway. While plantar warts can hurt, mine never did.

The directions for the "Clear Away" are very unclear. They say to repeat the process every 48 hours, however, it doesn't say how long to leave the disc on the wart. If you call the company for clarification of the directions, you reach a call center in Asia. The man who I spoke with, I felt sorry for him. He admitted that he was searching the company's website to answer my question. I finally told him that I already looked on their website myself and hung up.

The box for this product says, "Disc treatment for fast, effective removal." I feel that this is a bit misleading. After going through two boxes of these salicylic acid discs, I became frustrated. The discs weren't helping at all. I've heard that filing away the wart after using the discs will help, but it didn't.

In addition to the "Clear Away," I started using scissors to cut away the wart after the discs were removed. My foot bled, and it made it hard to walk since I didn't want dirt in my open wound. I had to repeat this process for weeks.

The wart was on my foot for six months before I started cutting on it. It vanished within a month afterward. When I spoke with a nurse practitioner about my experience, she just shook her head. What I did was completely unsafe. However, I suspected that on my own.

I managed to get rid of my plantar wart using the Clear Away product. However, it took extreme measures on my part and I do not recommend it. Not to mention that it's cheaper to use a one time freeze off treatment than have to buy many boxes of the Dr. Scholl's Clear Away Plantar Wart Remover discs.