Psoriasis Fingernail Problems       

Psoriasis is a chronic skin condition which affects over four million people in the United States. About thirty to fifty percent of people who suffer from psoriasis will also have problems with their fingernails. In rare cases, you can have psoriasis fingernail problems without actually having the more common psoriasis skin conditions.

Psoriasis is not contagious, but many people react as if it is when they first see it. This can be embarassing and uncomfortable for anyone with large patches of psoriasis on their skin or fingernails.

Psoriasis is a skin condition however, that is simply caused by the body producing too many skin cells too quickly. When the body's immune system over reacts to certain events - extreme infections, acute illness, and large amounts of stress for instance - it can respond by producing new skin cells and quickly pushing them to the surface of your skin. These extra skin cells create the scaly flaky patches of psoriasis.

When our bodies are working normally, it takes approximately one month for new skin cells to rise to the surface. During that time, the new cells are deep under the surface maturing and rising. The existing surface skin is slowly dying, and by the time the new cells fully reach the skin surface, the existing ones are ready to be shed.

With psoriasis however, the new skin cells rise rapidly. Often they reach the surface in just three to six days, and that hasn't been enough time for the existing surface skin to die off completely and start shedding. Usually, in about 80% of psoriasis cases, the pile up of new skin appears on the elbows, knees or scalp. It looks very dry, and has a flaky, scaly appearance to it.

About 30% - 50% of psoriasis sufferers also develop psoriasis fingernails too though. This is a similar condition, that involves a white flakiness of the fingernails. Often psoriasis fingernails have a pitted appearance, and they can be thicker than normal, as well as raised from the nail bed. Psoriasis fingernails are often easy to crumble too.

It's much less common, but psoriasis fingernails can have brown, red, or orange spots too. Psoriasis fingernails often occur in people who also have psoriasis skin patches, but in rare cases psoriasis can develop in the fingernails without any evidence on the skin itself.

Neither skin psoriasis or fingernail psoriasis is curable. Instead, medical specialists, physicians and researchers choose to treat the symptoms using topical ointments and creams, light therapy, and in severe cases: Injected medications.

Many topical treatments for skin or fingernail psoriasis involve the use of coal tar, a Vitamin D derivative, Vitamin A derivatives, or other medicines which are designed to suppress the rate of skin growth.

Light therapy can be used either alone or with topical treatments, because UV light is known to help heal psoriasis. This has to be done under supervision though, because getting a sunburn can cause more psoriasis flare ups.

In very severe cases of skin or fingernail psoriasis, injected or oral drugs are used which suppress the bodies immune system.