Neighborhood Chemist
Your friendly neighborhood chemist is not a skin specialist
This may seem like an obvious statement but you may shocked to know how often we see patients with side effects of wrongly prescribed oral medications and creams for skin problems.Also common are patients who choose to overlook the advice of their dermatologist because their chemist said that the medicines prescribed are too strong or dangerous.
We, Indians generally like to opt for quick fix solutions to our everyday problems especially medical issues. The notion that “doctor toh loot te hai” often directs the patients to their friendly neighbourhood chemist who despite his best intentions, is no expert to deal with skin problems.
Every skin issue needs a proper diagnosis to initiate an effective treatment plan. Patients who dabble in medications from unreliable sources often land up with worsening of their skin condition and harmful side effects. To add fuel to the fire, the clinical picture of many skin problems is altered by unscrupulous use of inappropriate medications necessitating interventions and procedures which could have been easily avoided if the patient had sought proper advice in the beginning. Of late, use of wrong medications has made some skin problems resistant to standard therapy options.
Point in case is rapid spread of antifungal resistance due to rampant steroid cream use. Once a steroid cream is applied to fungal lesions, it may give temporary relief for few days but aggravates the problem and also makes it resistant to standard doses of antifungals. Quite often it becomes difficult to differentiate the steroid treated infection from other skin problems even for the trained eye.
The result? There is delay in diagnosis and the patient has to take high doses of antifungals for longer periods of time. There are numerous other conditions like pigmentation which become treatment resistant after such misadventures.
So,it is advisable that every skin issue is addressed by a Dermatologist ..Just as you would trust your car with a mechanic and not a chef , trust your skin specialist for your skin problems.
