A recent (1/18/2010) article published in JAMA (The Journal of the American Medical Association) showed that the costs of brand-name treatments for psoriasis rose by an average of 66% between 2000 and 2008!
Average annual phototherapy costs ranged from $3,083 to $7,288, while biologic therapies ranged from $18,284 to $27,577 annually.
To put that into perspective, the lowest average amount paid annually for biologic treatments is roughly three times the cost of a 16-lamp UVBioTek home phototherapy system… a one-time expense that provides a lifetime of effective treatments – compared with $20K-$30K every year for biologic therapies.
For those few people for whom phototherapy is ineffective, or just not effective enough, biologics are virtual "miracle drugs" where the benefits almost outweigh the rather sizable risks for internal organ damage, cancer and other systemic side effects. But when phototherapy can be used instead, a home system would save over a quarter of a million dollars for each and every patient after just ten years!!
That article can be found here: Science Daily (1/20/2010)
Interestingly, the Archives of Dermatology has also summarized the very same article, with one notable exception; they removed all references to phototherapy! Ask your dermatologist whose interests they have in mind; your's or their pharmaceutical rep's… These numbers seem to point in the wrong direction.
