Management of Widespread Psoriasis with Conventional Systemic Agents

Management of widespread psoriasis with conventional systemic agents
Session overview
Description
This session focuses on the use of traditional (non-biological) systemic agents in the treatment of psoriasis.

Learning objectives
By the end of this session you will be able to:

• discuss the pros and cons of each of the commonly used oral agents for psoriasis
• formulate a treatment plan for selected patients with difficult psoriasis
• know how to monitor patients on each of the main oral therapies and be aware of their adverse effect profiles

Although psoriasis (Figure 1) is one of the commonest conditions in dermatology clinics and there are various therapeutic options available, treatment selection can be very challenging.

Many patients will manage well with simple topical therapies. However, these have significant drawbacks.

Formerly, those who did not do well on simple topical regimes were admitted to hospital for weeks at a time for escalating concentrations of coal tar or dithranol. This seems to have become less acceptable to patients and the number of dermatology in-patient beds has drastically reduced in many centres.

Systemic (and, more recently, biological) agents potentially offer an easy yet effective treatment for widespread or difficult psoriasis, leading to a better quality of life for those with the disease.