"being cared for with a chronic skin condition"

This is a patient request for consideration for the attention of photo therapy department at St Andrews Community Hospital.

As a psoriasis sufferer, over 40 years I have been receiving intermittent Phototherapy treatment either here in St Andrews and before that at Edinburgh Royal infirmary.

For the majority of psoriasis patients, this treatment is merely palliative and offers no permanent resolution for condition. Whilst it is effective in the short term, it is also fairly disruptive to lifestyle having to attend a short clinic three times a week for a large number of weeks.

I wish to offer for consideration, from my experience of this treatment, something which would make phototherapy more effective and less disruptive. This is in the offering of the facility of a separate shower and cream application unit close by /within the department so that patients can apply all the relevant creams after the shower and after the light treatment. All dermatologist and dermatology nurses will understand that the effectiveness of the creams and the emollients is greatly enhanced on damp skin. In addition, the smell of singing skin is unpleasant and a shower would certainly help this unpleasant side effect. 

Last week, I asked a nurse within the unit if there was a shower available within the hospital for this purpose. She answered that there were no public showers within the hospital. My response to her is that actually I was not the public but a patient with a particular need.

I am aware that the additional provision of the facilities that I propose is no small thing, however I believe that the efficacy of the treatment would be enhanced greatly for the patients and provide additional well-being which is something desperately short of for most patients suffering from chronic skin conditions.

I would be very grateful if this proposal could be added to the agenda of the next meeting of nurses and doctor dermatologists for consideration, and would be happy to attend any meeting in person to better represent the case from the patients side.

Thank you for your time in this consideration,