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A patient and her daughter share their personal history of living with psoriasis and how a new medication brought relief, hope and possible remission.
Doctors, psoriasis sufferers find hope in new drugs
Amevive treatment involves weekly injections on 12-week cycle
A new drug called Amevive is being used to treat moderate-to-severe psoriasis at the root--by suppressing overactive areas of the immune system--and is clearing up scaly, itchy, dry skin. And as similar drugs emerge, a local dermatologist is hoping the diversity will afford large populations of psoriasis sufferers the opportunity to have something once unheard of --clear skin. Amevive has already allowed some patients to go treatment-free for long periods of time with no outbreaks--which is highly unusual with this disease, said Dr. Artis Truett III, of Owensboro Dermatology.
"In the past, people have thought of psoriasis as a skin disease, but it is an immune system disease," Truett said during a recent interview at his office on New Hartford Road. "When certain areas of the immune system become stimulated, that can show up in the skin in the form of painful, itchy plaques of skin that are thick and scaly."
About 2.5 percent of the nation's population have some form of psoriasis. That would equate to about 2,200 people in Daviess County, and others from counties around the region travel to Daviess County for psoriasis treatment. Truett said current treatments of his first patient, Helen Ward of Calhoun, with Amevive injections have produced dramatic results, as skin over much of her body is now clear that was once covered with severe psoriasis. Calhoun recently began getting a third round of weekly injections of Amevive. The drug is administered in the doctor's office weekly, for 12 weeks at a time. The patient stops the treatment for 12 weeks, then gets another 12 weeks of injections.
"I broke out with this when I was 15 years old," Ward, 85, said. "If we had the money we spent trying to get rid of it, we'd be rich." Ward said her psoriasis has been extensive, covering her scalp, back, face, arms and legs. "I've been taking the Amevive since last April, and my skin has cleared up everywhere on my body, except for the back of my right leg," she said. She said with other treatments, like tar-based creams, the psoriasis was never completely gone. And for most of her life, Ward lived with skin that was red and scaly in patches in her scalp and over her arms, legs and face."People would ask me if I'd been burned or if I had a virus," she said.
Her daughter, Joyce Bennett of Newport News, Va, said as a child she was concerned about her mother's condition because she witnessed the pain Ward suffered with the disease. "She would wear long sleeves when everyone else was wearing short sleeves," Bennett recalled. "She scratched all the time. I've swept up a half-cup of scales from the floor because of her scratching." Bennett said the creams her mother used when Bennett was a child made Ward smell like tar. For more than 100 years, coal tar has been used to treat psoriasis. Then in 1925, the use of coal tar dressings was combined with ultraviolet light treatments for those like Ward who have severe psoriasis. Ward used both of those treatments with limited success. For 16 years, Ward took the anti-cancer drug Methotrexate, approved for the use in severe psoriasis cases when other treatments failed. During that time, Ward said her body was never completely clear of psoriasis. Because liver disease was a potential side effect of the drug, Ward had to undergo several liver biopsies. When Ward informed her doctor that she could no longer take getting liver biopsies, he refused to give her Methotrexate and her treatments stopped, she said. She was referred by her family doctor to Owensboro Dermatology clinic, where Truett began treating her with Amevive. Now Ward is hoping the final round of injections will clear up the large patch of thick psoriasis on the back of her leg.
"It is wonderful not to have anything in my scalp. The gel I used for the psoriasis in my scalp turned my hair green," she said. "I'm hoping I will be completely clear and it won't come back for at least two years."
Truett said he has similar hopes for Ward because other patients treated with three 12-week rounds of Amevive injections during clinical trials reported being free of psoriasis for one to two years.
"This is an exciting time to be treating psoriasis," he said. "Newer drugs are much safer over the long-term and much more effective than older treatments," Truett said.
Another similar drug, Raptiva, was approved for the treatment of moderate-to-severe psoriasis in October by the Food and Drug Administration. And producers of the drug Enbrel, which has been used to treat psoriatic arthritis since January 2002, have filed for FDA approval for use in psoriasis treatment. Studies with an oral drug known as BG-12 have proven successful in significantly reducing severe psoriasis. Truett said patients being treated with Amevive must have perioduc blood tests to monitor white blood cell counts to ensure infections aren't developing, which is a potential side effect of immune system suppressing drugs.
"No one drug will be successful in treating all people," he said. "These new treatments are giving psoriasis patients hope, not only in getting safe treatments but hope in the possiblility of finding a cure.
By Chris O'Nan
Messenger-Inquirer
