Innovations in the treatment of psoriasis

Abstract

In 1925, William Goeckerman presented a patient who had failed treatment of severe psoriasis with emetin, arsphenamin, intramuscular injection of mercury, staphylococcal vaccine, 25 injections of a streptococcal vaccine, Fowler's solution, autoserum injections, a 7 month nonprotein diet, x-ray therapy, tonsillectomy, and the extraction of seven teeth.1 In that paper, he described a successful regimen using tar and ultraviolet light to clear the patient. That regimen, known as the Goeckerman regimen, still remains a useful treatment of psoriasis; but over the decades since its publication there have been many improvements in the regimen, and phototherapy with ultraviolet B (UVB) remains a valuable part of psoriasis therapy. Fortunately, psoriasis, more than any other disease in dermatology, has paved the way for new treatments that have been introduced over the past 25 years, in large part through publication in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology.