Psoriasis, psoriasis treatment

Psoriasis is a very common and chronic skin disease.  The affected skin is generally red with a silver scaly appearance, and is found commonly on the knees and elbows; but can be found anywhere on the body.

Psoriasis is not an infection and touching an affected person will not give you the disease. Psoriasis is a non-contagious chronic skin condition that occurs when there is rapid skin cell growth. Normally, the cells of the skin grow in weeks allowing the body to shed excess skin. In the case of psoriasis, skin cells grow within days inhibiting skin shedding and causing piling on the skin surface    

Psoriasis is a very common occurring skin condition in which the skin is most effected. With psoriasis, you will experience lots of skin redness, flaking, and sometimes patchy scales on certain parts of your body. This skin disorder can effect many different people of different cultures and ages, but the age group most effected is from 15-35 years. One important thing to know is that, luckily, this disease cannot be spread to others. So if you know someone who has this condition, you do not have to worry about it "rubbing off" on you. It is not a contagious disease. If you take a look at psoriasis and how it happens, it seems to be passed down throughout families. This means you have a larger risk of getting psoriasis at some point if anyone in your family has had it.

Psoriasis seems to occur when your body's immune system gets confused and mistakes healthy cells for dangerous substances. It usually takes about a month for new skin cells to grow and develop. If you have psoriasis, this process occurs too fast (say it happens every two weeks instead of four which makes a big difference) and this results in dead skin cells being built up on the surface of the skin. Certain triggers may cause an occurrence of psoriasis and may complicate things further. Some examples are bacterial or viral infections, too much alcohol/too little sunlight, some medicines like beta blockers, dry skin, or injury to the skin. Psoriasis is especially a cause of concern in people with a low/weakened immune system because the disease can become very severe. If you are undergoing cancer chemotherapy, or have AIDS, this may be the case due to a lack of healthy cells in the body. Psoriasis arthritis can also occur, actually frequently, in about one third of all patients who have psoriasis.