Rascal
El Presidente
Hello pal, an interesting post.
I will comment on it and add my views.
There is no medical evidence that a change in diet clears psoriasis, none at all. but if it worked for you then by all means follow it because Psoriasis is so complicated, every0ne has different triggers. That is one of the reasons a cure hasnt been found. I worry that so many people out there are so desperate for a "cure" they fall for all sorts of quackery and there are plenty of people out there willing to sell false hope for profit. Hannah Sillitoe has books out on diet and exercise, I know Hannah and she is a lovely girl and she has been very successful with her books and if people find succour in them all the good, but I personally would not put all my faith in a book that has no medical validity. Of course it helps if you are healthy and that is true for virtually anything, but psoriasis specific I am not convinced because Psoriasis is caused by cells called Interleukins misbehaving and I cannot see how cutting out certain foods helps interleukins behave normally. There is ongoing research into genetics at the moment, an organisation called Global Psoriasis Atlas is mapping symptons around the world and comparing. This may lead to peoples diets being a factor as their is a certain group of people in Greenland who have never had a recorded case of Psoriasis and it is linked to their diet of fish. Whether turns out to be medical fact though is a few years away at the moment.
Psoriasis isnt a disease, its a condition, this is very important, calling it a disease infers it can be transferred or "caught" by another person, that is not the case, you cannot catch Psoriasis, its a reaction to your immune system being out of balance.
UVB,UVA,PUVA are all used, i have tried them all, for some people it works really well, this is linked to vitamin D, a lot of the steroid creams that you can get are vitamin D derivate, such as Dovonox and Dovobet. There is research still ongoing into its overall effectiveness and whilst for some its brilliant, for some it actually makes things worse. Again the complexity of Psoraisis means nothing is diffinitive.
Smoking and Alcohol are a massive no no. Research is being done into smoking i think, i smoke, i wish i didnt but i like a fag. Alcohol if you think about it makes perfect sense. If you have a dozen pints then in the morning your mouth will be dry, it is the same with your skin. So alcohol should be avoided, yet i gave up for 17 months and it had zero effect on my psoriasis, it didnt get worse, but it didnt improve either. I have a drink now but its not so often and during lockdown i have only a beer one day and that was 6 cans sat in the garden one sunny day, again its made zero difference to me. I say though if you can stop smoking and drinking do it, it cant do your health any harm.
I notice you mention stress, stress is a known trigger for many skin disorders, i have no idea why and i think it baffles the medical world, there is no reason why it should as far as i know, but it does and some of the worst cases i have ever seen are as a result of stress.
I find your "dont trust the docs" statement pretty scary to be honest, i have know my Prof and his team for over 30 years and i trust them implcitly, i know they have my best interests at heart and i hope by your statement you mean GPs rather than specialists. If you do, i can understand that because GPs are simply not equipped or knowledgeable enough to deal with a complex condition. They only spend 2 days of a 7 year medical degree on skin, as there are more skin conditions than you can you can shake a stick at, its not their fault there knowledge is limited. I have helped train GPs at SRFT in diagnosing Psoriasis and most did diagnose it correctly, but they are simply not abreast of treatments, they cant be as its a speciality. I would advise anybody with Psoriasis to ask their GP for a specialists referall.
I agree Psoriasis forums are dark places, the incidence of suicide amongst the psoriasis community is much higher than the national average and the psychological impacts of Psoriasis are hard and can be devastating for some. I have been asked if i had been in a fire, i have been told i am dirty, i have people who refuse to touch me, people will stare at me and one time i was with a group of people outside the ward at Salford who all had Psoriasis and we were asked if we were a leper colony. Now i am mentally quite strong, but can you imagine for one moment the effect that asking somebody who was unsure and lacked confidence that tasking them if they were a leper might have on them.
There is research into the psychological impacts of Psoriasis and Psoritaic Arthritis led by another of my Profs. the Brilliant Prof Bundy, she is a health psychologist based in Cardiff now and has worked in Psoriasis for years and worked on an initiative called the PSOwell clinic where people with the condition can get psychological help and couselling. So you get a more holistic approach to treatments. I was one of the drivers behind Psychological impacts being researched at the last Psoriasis priority setting partnership and i am really proud that on mine and others insistence there is loads of research now going into the psychological impacts.
Thanks for your post Mr Hombre, you make some valid points and i am really pleased its working for you, however we are all different and we should all keep an open mind. The future is not far away and my Prof is working on a new theme called stratified medicine, with which hopefully a single blood test will identify the exact treatment that will work best for you. That could be diet, it could be tablets, it could be biologics, but whatever the outcome it will be a stunning medical advancement. I was invited to London for showcase on the progress and there were Profs from all around the world there such is the excitement at this development.
Fingers crossed hey.