Effective Treatment for Genital Warts

If your warts aren't causing discomfort, you may not need treatment. But if your symptoms include itching, burning and pain, or if visible warts are causing emotional distress, your doctor can help you clear an outbreak with medications or surgery. However, the lesions are likely to come back after treatment.
Condylomata acuminata genital warts is,of course, a sexually transmitted disease caused by Human Papillomavirus (HPV).
There are three basic ways of getting rid of genital warts (or any warts, for that matter). The first way is to destroy all of the tissue where the wart virus resides. This is usually done surgically by excising all of the warts or burning them off with electrocautery. We probably will not be doing this much in correctional facilities.

Irritant Chemicals
The second approach is to apply an irritating chemical to the wart which works mainly by stimulating the patient’s immune system to recognize the diseased tissue and to destroy it. There are various irritant chemicals that can be used for this purpose: Trichloroacetic acid and podophyline mentioned by Aldo work, but podofilox, sinecatchins, and imiquinod are considered by dermatologists to be superior (and more expensive) agents. These chemicals are all quite irritating so they need to be meticulously applied. Many of them, like trichloracetic acid, should not be applied to the normal surrounding skin. One way to do this is to create a moat-barrier of vaseline around the wart before you apply the irritant. For a patient with a lot of warts, this can take quite a bit of time. Also, these agents should be applied often. Trichloroacetic acid is applied every 3 days. Podofilox is applied 2 times a day for 3 days then not applied for 4-7 days and then the cycle is repeated. Imiquod is applied 3 times a week for 8 weeks. Clearly the chemical agents are labor intensive.
In the outside world of dermatology, these agents are typically only used on patients who are considered reliable and careful enough to apply these chemicals themselves. This would not work in a correctional setting, of course. There is too much risk of patients doing it wrong or using the irritating chemicals in mischievous ways. However, to bring these patients into the prison clinic for each of these meticulous and time consuming applications takes too much of your time and effort. This is true of outside dermatology clinics, as well. Patients who are not good candidates for self-application of the chemicals are treated with the third treatment option, cryotherapy.
Surgery Treatment for Genital Warts
You may need surgery to remove larger warts, warts that don't respond to medications, or — if you're pregnant — warts that your baby may be exposed to during delivery. Surgical options include:
Freezing with liquid nitrogen (cryotherapy). Freezing works by causing a blister to form around your wart. As your skin heals, the lesions slough off, allowing new skin to appear. You may need repeated cryotherapy treatments. The main side effects include pain and swelling.
Electrocautery. This procedure uses an electrical current to burn off warts. You may have some pain and swelling after the procedure.
Surgical excision. Your doctor may use special tools to cut off warts. You'll need local or general anesthesia for this treatment, and you may have some pain afterward.

Laser treatments. This approach, which uses an intense beam of light, can be expensive and is usually reserved for very extensive and tough-to-treat warts. Side effects can include scarring and pain.