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Since this is my first entry, I wanted to spend a moment to introduce myself. I have many roles, hats and ways to identify myself as anyone might. Telling others I have psoriasis is not my choice way of describing who I am. And, yet, having psoriasis is like the cheese on a pizza; it permeates and penetrates every single piece and part. This blog represents one way for me to share this part of my life with others that I normally would not (at least initially) and hopefully encourage others to do the same.
I have another reason I would like to write about my experience with psoriasis: I had so little personal contact and understanding about my condition throughout the years. When I was seven years old, red, scaly sores erupted on my knees and elbows. My father whisked me to the local dermatologist at our HMO who then referred us to UCSF medical center (University of California at San Francisco). After waiting some three hours for the dermatologist and his residents, I was poked and prodded for about ten minutes then given a diagnosis: plaque psoriasis. I don’t think we were so enlightened back then to address the emotional needs of a child with psoriasis. Certainly my parents, Chinese immigrants, did not communicate on that level with me.
Fast forward almost 30 years. Covered from head to toe with nasty sores and still smarting from a narrow-band UVB burn, I found myself sitting once again at UCSF in the psoriasis day-care clinic. (The HMO dermatologist petitioned for me to see a psoriasis expert at UCSF). The professor explained I had two options to treat the 95% coverage: cyclosporine and Goeckermann (a six-hour a day tar treatment combined with UVB). My dermatologists in the past scared me awa ...