Health Matters: Improve Your Skin and Your Confidence

If you live with a skin disease, your self-esteem is usually the first to go.

Skin diseases like psoriasis and vitiligo can affect anyone and thanks to our dry Midwest winters, many people in the Red River Valley are suffering.

Fortunately, there are a wide variety of treatments available, fixing people’s skin and their self-confidence too.

Jordana Cook loves her job.

Working as an RN at Essentia Health, she sees patients at their worst and eventually, at their best.
 
“So it’s fun to compare the first time I meet them and how their self-esteem is so low and they’re very embarrassed by the psoriasis that they have compared to the last treatment when I see them,” says Essentia Health RN, Jordana Cook.
 
Jordana helps patients suffering from skin diseases including psoriasis and vitiligo.

Psoriasis is red, itchy patches on the skin. In vitiligo, pigment is lost from areas of the skin resulting in white colored patches.

Both are common and both are treatable.
 
“It’s a laser using UVB rays to target the effected skin leaving the unaffected healthy tissue unaffected,” says Cook.
 
The Xtrac laser is used for patients suffering with psoriasis on smaller surface areas of their bodies.

But there are other options too, like a full body light booth.
 
“There are some people that don’t respond to it and then the dermatologist will take a deeper look and see if anything else is going on,” says Cook.
 
If that doesn’t work, medication is also an option.

Unfortunately, because psoriasis is an autoimmune disorder it never really goes away.
 
“Psoriasis can never be cured so with this device were putting them into remission,” says Cook.
 
But with no side effects and good results, Jordana loves that she has a helping hand in making a huge difference.
 
“It does affect patients greatly no matter if they have vitiligo or psoriasis so it’s just nice that we do have treatments available here at Essentia Health,” says Cook.

Since psoriasis can never be cured, when a person is treated they are essentially going into remission.

Unfortunately, remission only lasts between four to six months.

While treatments have a high success, they are not a one-time thing.