Michaela Dinboeck recently participated in a small experiment. The General Manager and President of Novartis Corporation Malaysia had a make-up artist apply on her neck area patches that resembled the reddish scaly skin of a person with psoriasis. Her colleagues and friends were not notified of this experiment, so they were taken aback when they saw her.

Wearing the patch was not a pleasant experience. “By the time afternoon rolled in, I wanted to just tear the patch off,” she recalls.

Perhaps just as hard to swallow was the reaction of the people she met on that day. Colleagues and friends who know her well still kept a distance from her, conversations became hesitant and cold, and there were looks on their faces to suggest strongly that they did not want to come too close in fear of catching her ‘disease’.

Even her children hesitated to approach her when she came home. “Mommy, you look horrible!” they cried when they saw the patches. Despite her coaxing, her children refused to hug her until she removed the patch.

She did, and they finally gave her a hug. But as Ms Dinboeck embraced her children, her single day of walking in the shoes of someone with psoriasis revealed with heartbreaking surety that there are people with psoriasis out there, somewhere, who face such reactions daily. And these people have no easy means to remove the signs of their affliction. Psoriasis causes not only physical discomfort and pain – it can slowly eat away at the soul.

But, there is more hope for these people now. This Mini-Report will give you an insight into psoriasis as well as a common complication of that affliction, psoriatic arthritis, and how improved treatment options can change lives for the better.  

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