Sinead Okafor used to start treating a flare on about day nine, when it had become unbearable, which is roughly eight days too late.
The psychological load of a visible condition is asked about routinely at every appointment, because it does not correlate with severity and is otherwise never mentioned.
Treatment that gets used
Flare plans are written down with thresholds, so treatment starts on day one of a flare rather than on day nine when it has become unbearable.
People wait because nobody told them what the trigger was. So we wrote the trigger down.
Dr. Ilse Marchand, dermatology
The steroid nobody explained
Under-treatment driven by fear of a treatment is more common in this clinic than over-treatment, and the fear is usually acquired from well-meaning advice.
“I don’t have to decide any more,” she says. “It’s written on a card in the bathroom.”
Leave a Reply