How UVBioTek Keeps Me Normal: A typical tale of psoriasis and treatment success.

Hello. My name is Ava. I'm 24 years old and I have psoriasis. I didn't know that I had psoriasis for a long time. When I was about 14, my dad got a new job that moved us to New York City. I really liked the city and my new school. Then I experienced my first real winter. I also experienced my first psoriasis flare-up. I had no idea what "psoriasis" was. I'd never seen anything like it on anyone else. I thought my life was over.

It seemed like it was overnight, I noticed really rough skin on my knees and shins. These scaly patches got worse and I started to worry that there really might be something wrong with me. I felt perfectly fine, but I was afraid to wear anything that allowed anyone to see my legs. By the end of that month, I was starting to see the same kind of patches on my elbows and decided to see my doctor.

My doctor checked me over and said, "Looks like you've got a little psoriasis. I'll prescribe some creams for you and it should clear that right up." I asked him what psoriasis was, and he said it was no big deal and I shouldn't worry about it. That was easy for him to say, and impossible for me to believe. My legs had gotten so bad by this point that they didn't look like "rough skin" anymore. They looked like they were covered with scabs. Making things worse, any time my legs brushed against something they left behind streaks of what look like dandruff flakes. I didn't want to touch anything or have anyone touch me.

I had just started to use the Internet around then, and I started searching around for anything that said "psoriasis". I learned that many different treatments were available, far too many to list and way too many to believe. Everything from sleeping in a sweat suit to covering your body in tar to soaking in salts from the Dead Sea to waving crystals around your head while chanting softly; I think I tried them all and nothing helped. I did drop a crystal on my toe and that didn't help either. I learned that psoriasis wasn't something that I suddenly "got", it was something that I'd always had. I also learned that stress and depression actually make it worse; that was really depressing to learn.

Then I read about UVB phototherapy. It also sounded too good to be true. No pills, no sweatsuits, no shots, no tar, no creams; just stand in front of some lights for a few minutes every other day - that's all. The National Psoriasis Foundation's website has a section that allows you to search for doctors who use and/or prescribe UVB treatments. Using their site, I found a doctor who was just 30 minutes away and scheduled the first available appointment, which was in about a month.

The new dermatologist was very nice. She looked me over, asked me a few questions and told me that I probably already knew that I had psoriasis. She said she'd seen a lot worse and seemed positive that I could get back to looking normal again. I said that would be nice, and she said she understood completely. I told her that I'd heard that a lot. Then she pulled out an old photo of herself at about my age. She had psoriasis all over her hands and her neck and looked just as unhappy as I felt. She told me that she had gone through the same thing herself, and it wasn't until she started using UVB phototherapy that she started to get better; in fact, that was what led her to become a dermatologist.

She said that based on my history, I was a good candidate for UVB phototherapy and prescribed three sessions a week; Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. I said I was concerned about getting skin cancer, like my regular doctor said when I mentioned it to him. She said that too many doctors don't understand the problem at all. Frequent sunburns damage the skin and that increases your risk for cancer. With UVB phototherapy you only use as much light as you can without burning your skin, and there's simply no evidence showing any connection between the proper use of UVB light and an increased risk for cancer.

It sounded great but it wasn't easy. It meant my mom had to drive me there, wait for me to finish, and then drive me back home again... three times a week. My mom and I got pretty much sick of the whole thing with driving over an hour to get there three times a week in order to take what was now only a one minute treatment that cost my mom $100 per session. All the same, about a week later, once I had worked up to a minute and 30 seconds, my skin got pink and felt "tighter". The phototherapist had said that was to be expected and that I should skip the next session on Monday, then come back Wednesday... when we'd drop back to a minute and 10 seconds, then start again until we worked up to the maximum UVB my skin could be exposed to without causing a burn. For me, that turned out to be only a minute and 35 seconds. It took us nearly an hour to get there, 10-15 minutes in the waiting room, 5-10 minutes to get undressed, and then less than two minutes in the lights. Then we were looking at another hour for me to get dressed again and make it back home. It was really tedious, but my mom said it seemed to be working.

After a few of weeks, even though it seemed to be helping me a lot, I told my dermatologist I didn't think my mom could keep driving me back and forth much longer. She said she understood and gave me a prescription for a phototherapy system to use in my own room! She said that she thought I was smart enough to use it without hurting myself and gave me some brochures showing various home systems, including one she had at her own home. It was a smaller version of the system I'd been using in her office, which was made by UVBioTek. She said that she looked at others and, while they were a little more expensive than the others, she had found UVBioTek systems were much better designed and built. She said it would probably last me for the rest of my life, so I should look through all of them.

I checked them all out and I agreed with her; the UVBioTek system was the best choice by a long shot. All the other systems looked like something you'd see in a hospital; I wouldn't want one of those in my own home. UVBioTek systems look like they were designed to be used at home from the start. They don't even look like medical systems when closed; just like a tall cabinet. I told my mom that it cost over $6,000 and expected her to freak out, but she didn't. She simply said that it would be a lot less than the $300 we'd been paying every week, and we'd already spent at least a thousand dollars on treatments (not including the travel costs), so it seemed like a no-brainer to her. When we called UVBioTek, they told us about their "Smart Lease" program that let my mom buy the system for a smaller monthly payment than what we were paying every WEEK for my office appointments! That was like renting instead of buying.

In about a week, a big truck pulled up to our house with my new system. My dad and a friend of his took two boxes off the back of the truck and set it up in my room within a couple of hours. Once it was up and ready to go, a UVBioTek rep called to make sure the system was fully operational, to go over the safety features, and answer any questions I might have. I had a lot of questions, but I got them all answered. The rep could not have been nicer or more patient with me and I felt confident when I took my first session that evening. They even helped us to file the purchase with my dad's insurance, who finally reimbursed us for almost half of the cost of the system (although it took almost six months and a lot of phone calls.)

Having a UVBioTek system in my room changed my life. It's my own "sunshine system" in my own bedroom. What took a minute and a half in the clinic only took a minute and 20 seconds at home. I never expected a home system would be faster than the dermatologist's system. After about two months, I was clear enough that I was back to just having rough patches on my knees, which were getting smaller and smaller. I can't tell you how thrilling it was to finally do something as simple as wearing a pair of Capri pants and a tank top. I felt like a new person. I started wearing my hair back up the way I liked it, stopped being so self-conscious about my appearance, and ended up meeting a great guy who had no idea there was anything wrong with me... Now that I think about it, there IS nothing wrong with me, now that I have my own system!

Thank you UVBioTek for giving me back my life again!