Derm-it Trotter! Don't Swear About Skincare.
Feeling frustrated or overwhelmed with everything skin? Does the skinformation overload make you want to swear about skincare? Join Dr. Shannon C. Trotter, board certified dermatologist, as she talks with fellow dermatologists and colleagues in skincare to help separate fact from fiction and simplify the world of skin. After listening, you won’t swear about skincare anymore!
Derm-it Trotter! Don't Swear About Skincare.
Remission For Psoriasis And Eczema: Hype or the Future?
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Remission in psoriasis and eczema is no longer just theoretical—it’s becoming a real treatment goal. In this episode, Dr. Joe Tung explains why chronic inflammatory skin diseases act more like high blood pressure than a one-time rash, and why clear skin doesn’t always mean the disease is gone—especially when considering stopping biologics or systemic therapy.
We break down what remission actually means, why flares return (even after skin looks clear), and how immune “memory” drives recurring inflammation. We also explore differences in atopic dermatitis, the impact of early treatment, and what emerging research says about the future—from dose spacing to immune reprogramming.
If you’re thinking about long-term control—not just short-term results—this episode gives you a smarter, science-based framework to guide your decisions.
kind of thinking to dermatology. We do have a lot of different chronic diseases within dermatology.
SPEAKER_00What we're thinking, and I know there's still some debate about this to a degree, you know, and developing consensus on what's considered remission or eczema or atopic dermatitis or even psoriasis now.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So I think something really important happened actually just last year. Active disease is going to be that active visible flame, right? That's your plaque, that's your symptoms, that's your itch, that's the flares. Your medication is like a bucket of water.
Meet The Guest And The Goal
SPEAKER_00Too and I know we've talked more psoriasis, like what about in the eczema atopic dermatitis space? What are you seeing there?
SPEAKER_01Welcome to Dermitter, Don't Swear About Skin Care, where host Dr. Shannon C. Schmater, a board certified dermatologist, sits down with fellow dermatologists and skincare experts to separate fact from fiction and simplify skincare. Let's get started.
SPEAKER_00Welcome to the Dermitter Don't Swear About Skin Care podcast. On today's show I've got Dr. Joe Tung, board certified derm medical director at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Folk Dermatology. He even directs clinical trials where he does a lot of research with new medications for all things skin. And he's associate director of the dermatology residency program. So even loves to train future dermatologists. Welcome to the podcast Joe. It's great to have you here.
SPEAKER_02Thank you so much, Shannon. You know, I I think you're doing such a great thing with this podcast and it's an honor to be on today.
What Chronic Skin Disease Means
SPEAKER_00Well thank you. It's great to have you here as well. I'm excited to really hear your thoughts on kind of what we want to talk about in dermatology. And I I think what we wanted to hone in on the topic is skin disease in general and talking about how chronic it is and the thought of remission that we can actually put certain skin conditions like psoriasis, eczema, we can actually put these bad boys as you will away for long periods of time so people actually do well with their skin. But first I want to talk to you about what does it even mean to have a chronic disease? Because I think this is something that can be hard for the dermatologist to explain sometimes, but then also for patients to truly understand as well just what chronic means.
SPEAKER_02Of course I think that's a really good place to start as well Shannon. So I think most of us would agree with the official CDC and WHO definition of chronic disease, which is usually any disease that's at least three months in duration or longer and generally requires ongoing management. And so when we apply that kind of thinking to dermatology we do have a lot of different chronic diseases within dermatology. One in four in fact so if you think of your three best friends you know in the room one in four of them will have a chronic inflammatory skin disease. Of those, you know, you think about the ones that I see day to day in my clinic those are things like eczema you know 30 million American adults up to 25% of pediatric patients with eczema at some point in their life seven and a half million Americans with psoriasis. Then you think about diseases like hydraanitis superativa, one of the most devastating things I see day to day in clinic. And then of course you know vid LIGO, chronic spontaneous erdiria the list is pretty long here, Shannon.
SPEAKER_00Yeah and I think you know for our patient when they think chronic, they're like, oh my like what does that mean for me? And I think what you and I appreciate is that they're more challenging sometimes to manage in the thought that we don't really you know cure them, right? Like we're not going to necessarily be offer a cure as much as we have tools to control disease better. And it's scary how many chronic conditions we treat like just something as simple as acne or even rosacea or even precancer lesions called actinic keratosis or even in that chronic bucket. It's a good job security first Joe, but frustrating for patients I think too. Why do you think it's so important for patients to get an idea if something's chronic because I I do think for them when they hear chronic, you know they think, oh my, what does that really mean? And I don't know if patients always get the idea where we're trying to educate them what chronic means to us.
SPEAKER_02I think that's a really good point as well Shannon. So I think the point of chronic is really important because of some of the clinical implications for our patients. I like to take a step back and think about diseases like high blood pressure or diabetes. And in clinic this is the way I explain chronic inflammatory skin disease to my patients as well. Nobody really expects you know to take your blood pressure medication for three months and then your blood pressure is under decent control. You stop the medication and all of a sudden your high blood pressure is cured, right? We kind of understand intuitively that the medication is controlling the disease when you're on it. But once you stop, you know, your blood pressure is going to go back up. But when you kind of take that mental model over to inflammatory skin disease I do think there's a big education gap there, you know, among providers as well as among patients. One of the recent things I I read recently is that roughly half of all dermatology patients stopped their dermatology medication within eight weeks after starting it. Eight weeks. And when you take a look at the number one reason they saw improvement with their skin disease they assumed the disease was cured and they stopped the medication. I think that's a big you know education gap but also a failure of communication on the side of healthcare professionals. But here's why it really matters Shannon we know that a lot of these chronic inflammatory skin disease they're not just skin related diseases. They're really systemic disease. If you take something like severe psoriasis, we have really good data to show that patients with severe psoriasis actually have an 80% increased mortality risk. On average their lives are five years shorter than those without severe psoriasis depression rates are much higher suicidal ideation is much higher. So I think one of the key points here is that understanding that these diseases are chronic is what motivates long-term treatment engagement. And this long-term engagement is what really produces some of these more life-changing outcomes for our patients.
Why People Stop Meds Too Soon
SPEAKER_00Gosh I I I just really like what you said there and kind of want to hit on a few points there to illustrate one, you know, I I have a patient we'll just call him Bob name not clear enough Bob but he said the example you mentioned he has high blood pressure and he came into our clinic and we were reviewing his medication list and I said oh I see you're on this medication I know it's used for high blood pressure do you have high blood pressure and he said no he's like I don't have high blood pressure at all and I said oh and I said so what do you say well I I used to have high blood pressure before I treated it. And so the assumption was the medication cured him where I said oh I said well technically we still consider you as having high blood pressure it's just the medicine you're using is now controlling this so your blood pressure's back into a normal range. And I said I think that sometimes happens like you just mentioned with chronic skin conditions like eczomercoriasis, you know, we get a medication skin's looking fantastic. So the assumption is oh the medicine must must have fixed it right and you and I know differently it's controlling it. And so keeping on the medication you know potentially yes lifelong for a lot of these conditions or at least extended periods of time you know is what results in that control. And it doesn't mean we don't have options to change it up. You know as you know with some of our newer medications we're looking at different dosing strategies. People believe less medications more but it doesn't mean none of a medication you know to maybe keep our skin condition in check. So I think that's really a good point you make really on the patient side to highlight hey it's the medicine that's keeping it away not some magical cure. So it'd be important to stay on it and the provider setting those expectations for patients too so they don't just stop things out of the blue. I'm sure you've experienced it too where somebody has stopped in medicine because they thought their psoriasis was gone forever or their eczema was and lo and behold it definitely came back. Have you experienced that scenario?
SPEAKER_02Oh every every day Shannon I do think that paradigm is starting to change where now you know we are thinking more about this concept of remission and what that looks like to segue to you know thinking about cures in the future. So I do think you know like you alluded to some of our newer biologic agents you know does have some good data that I you know would love to discuss you know in in terms of remission.
SPEAKER_00Yeah and remission I want you to kind of talk more about that because I think a lot of people hear remission and the average person probably listening out there might even think especially if they're not in healthcare I think of remission and cancer right you know that's probably their first thought when they hear somebody's in remission and this concept that we could have remittive or effects or somebody could be in remission from their skin condition is kind of new or novel, you know, I think for patients and even for providers that may have been practicing for a while because we just didn't have medications at our disposal that truly did that so well is what we have today. So you know definitions are important. So I was going to have you kind of just talk about definitions of what we're thinking and I know there's still some debate about this to a degree you know and developing consensus on what's considered remission or eczema or atopic dermatitis or even psoriasis now.
Defining Remission In Psoriasis
SPEAKER_02Yeah so I think something really important happened actually just last year, Shannon. So in 2025 the National Psirasis Foundation actually gathered close to a hundred different experts together and for the very first time published a consensus definition of remission for psoriasis. That definition is this 0% body surface area affected sustained for at least six months while on treatment okay so again 0% body surface area so complete clearance while on treatment for at least six months that's the definition for on treatment remission. Now the holy grail you know off treatment remission or drug-free remission I think that's where the disease stays quiet after you stop the medication entirely again for six months to one year period. For topic dermatitis though, that we don't yet have that same level of formal consensus in the field yet but for me personally it's a similar definition really achieve trying to achieve complete clearance for my patients whether it's on therapy remission or off therapy remission. And I think you know this definition which you know millions of people in the United States affected by psoriasis and eczema and really just coming to a consensus on the definition over the past year, I think that's really important because the first step to solving any problem is really knowing what it is that we're targeting, what we're going after, right?
The Bonfire Analogy For Flares
SPEAKER_00Mm-hmm What are your thoughts on kind of the whole stop medication? Because I have a lot of patients and some of those listeners out here that they may have been on a biologic for their psoriasis now for a while, been perfectly clear for years, or they may have a topic derm experiencing you know the same benefit from one of our therapies that are out there. If they're in remission how do you talk with your patients they're like hey you know Joe or they'll say Dr. Tung you know I I definitely want to stop potentially this medication. This is not for me, Dr. Tung I I think I got to do something, you know, or go off of it because I feel like you know I'm doing really well and I prefer to be on less medicine. How do you handle that question right now?
The Studies Behind Drug-Free Time
SPEAKER_02And that's probably the number one question I get in my clinic for my inflammatory skin disease patients. Before anything else they're like look Dr. Tung how long do I need to be on this medication for? So the analogy I use here is thinking about a bonfire. Okay so we think about a bonfire here that active disease is going to be that active visible flame right that's your plaque that's your symptoms that's your itch that's the flares. Your medication is like a bucket of water. So you throw the bucket of water over this flame and you can you know on the surface look like the fire is all completely put out. That's remission here that's on treatment remission looks like the fire's out. But what we know from science is that that firewood underneath they're still hot there's still tiny little embers within that so if you walk away too soon that fire does start right back up again. That's the story you know I've been telling my patients up to this point. But Shannon over the past year to two years I think that paradigm is really starting to change with some of our newer agents and some of these newer research studies.
SPEAKER_00Well I know people don't always love to hear studies or about the data. I know you just kind of provided the perfect segue to that but there was the study for psoriasis kind of has a cool name knockout study which I love you know and I think patients would appreciate that as well. I I wanted you to break it down like if you're talking you know to a patient what are the you know the findings from this you know you know and what does it really mean for you and maybe how we're going to treat your psoriasis.
SPEAKER_02Yeah there are actually two studies I would love to talk about the first is that knockout study. The second one is a complementary study called the guide study. So remember that fire analogy we just talked about right so you have the firewood staying hot even when the active flames are out. Why is that? The reason for that is because there's a specific immune cell called your tissue resident memory T cell I'll call it memory T cell just for short. These cells basically camp out permanently in your skin and they restart the inflammation when they're triggered our biologics can kind of silence them but they don't eliminate these memory T cells completely. That's the fundamental reasons you know plax psoriasis comes back and oftentimes in the same spot right do you see a lot of these patients who kind of come back and their flares are always in similar spots. For instance I have one patient you know I see every year around this time around tax season he works as a tax accountant in Pittsburgh and you know when he gets really stressed out when it gets busy March April tax season he gets a flare of psoriasis exact same spot right behind the ear every single year. So why is that that's because your memory T cells living you know in the in the surface of the skin there. So now onto this knockout study, this was published late last year, what the investigators did was they gave high doses of one of the of the FDA approved psoriasis medications called risen kismab at doses up to four times the normal dose but at just three time points. So you get that week zero, one month later you got your second dose and then three months after that you got your third dose then they stopped the medication altogether. Now about eight to nine months from that last dose of medication they observed that three in five patients about 60% of patients were still completely clear or almost clear. Almost two years later after their last injection medication two patients still remain completely clear. And I think this is the part that was really interesting. Okay so when they biopsy the skin on these patients the memory T cells those that you know remained in the skin and caused inflammation those were reduced to levels of completely normal healthy skin. So our high dose of medication didn't just put out a fire it removed that firewood completely. So I think that's the first study that really gave us some thought of course the caveat here is that it was just a 20 person study with no placebo group. So as a proof of concept study I think it's quite significant but of course a lot of additional work still needs to be done here. The second study that actually complements this is a study called a guide study. It got a little bit less attention Shannon just because most of this study was done in Europe rather than the United States. It used another one of our introduction 23 agents Hussel Kumab also FDA approved for moderate severe plaxoriasis and this was across 80 different centers hundreds of patients in Germany and France. It also had three phases in the study where patients first got injections and then there was a second phase where there was dose de-escalation so they started spacing out this medication more and more for patients. And then there was a third period of complete withdrawal where patients stopped who cell CMAB injections completely those who achieved complete clearance they call them super responders. They just didn't get any more medication after that and a little over a quarter of these patients so over 25% of these patients did not need any treatment with injections one year later. I think that's pretty meaningful but the what's really exciting about this one study is the exact type of patients who were able to be super responders and then maintain clearance off of treatment. What the study found was that those patients who received treatment really early on in the disease course, so patients treated within the first 15 months of their very first symptom, those were the patients who had the longest period of treatment free period. So those were the patients who are able to achieve this off therapy remission and the highest rate. So I think the message is pretty simple between these two studies. We have a pretty narrow window of opportunity to really treat these patients early on in their disease course and if we miss that we might be playing catch up for many years afterwards.
Why Early Treatment Changes Outcomes
SPEAKER_00Yeah and I I think it illustrates to the immune system you know is kind of like somebody who's been doing something for a while, right? That old saying you can't you know teach an old dog new tricks, right? Maybe the immune system is the same way. Once it's fallen into those patterns, it's really difficult to persuade it to kind of go back to sort of the normal state of where we'd want it, especially if we want to achieve kind of what we're seeing for remission. But really important as you and I know with any inflammatory skin condition, people tend to do much better when that fire first starts, right? Versus if it's been smoldering or burning for a while. And I think it's just fascinating because it shows us how the immune system can be very you know relatively dynamic, but then also the persistence of it once things have really gotten started there. So I think that's exciting to kind of see you know and you know also with the data encouraging people we suspect they have an inflammatory skin condition or their family doctor does to get them into dermatology so we can really address this early on. We know better outcomes exist with that too. And I know we've talked more psoriasis like what about in the eczema atopic dermatitis space? What are you seeing there?
SPEAKER_02Yeah yeah so one last point here because I think you really have the nail on the head there. So there's this concept that we consider epigenetic scarring right so we have genetics and we have epigenetics and this concept of epigenetic is scarring where the skin cells accumulate these molecular changes over time that lower the threshold for inflammation to restart I think that's a really important concept right so for a lot of our providers you know when we have visible changes for instance in diseases like hydraionitis superativa where after a period of time you start to see the scarring, the tunnels those patients, you know, we can tell that they have architectural change and those patients become a lot more difficult to treat medically. But for some of our more common inflammatory skin diseases things like psoriasis and eczema we don't really associate the same in terms of scarring but we know on an epigenetic level those patients you know do have are harder to treat. So I think for patients it's important to really recognize disease early and get in to see a dermatology provider, get started on advanced therapy earlier. And then for providers I think it's also really important that we really have this narrow window of opportunity. We don't have time to really play around we have to be aggressive with therapy we have to achieve that a goal of getting to clearance as fast as we can for these patients with inflammatory skin disease. And eczema as well you know there's a a lot of data a atopic dermatitis does tell a little bit of a different story here than psoriasis. Part of it is because you know we have a lot of different factors with the environment really coming in with eczema about 30% of our AD patients will have a genetic mutation in one of the proteins called phalagrin as well. So think about that as you know having these buildings with holes in them. Okay so even if you put out the fire perfectly these triggers can continue to get back into the skin. And so the remission bar is a little bit higher with our eczema patients. With some of our near biologic agents though we do see some of this data around remission. So one of our new biologic agents leprachismab actually had patients who were responders. They also stopped the medication four months into treatment and of those patients who are initial responders over half of them maintained a near complete clearance of their skin eight months after discontinuation. So after four months didn't get a single injection after that at the one year mark over half of patients were still maintaining a close to complete clearance state and this pipeline is also moving really fast here.
What Remission Looks Like In Eczema
Triggers That Can Break Remission
SPEAKER_00We now have clinical trials looking at you know extended half-life biologics within the eczema space you know we have new mechanisms like regulatory T cell therapies aimed at producing you know true immune reprogramming as well well and it's it's just exciting where we're going with that you know that we can have potentially you know that that impact on skin conditions and when you mentioned the epigenetic scarring I wanted to circle back to just for a moment because you mentioned how important for providers to recognize you know that that can occur and there's a need to intervene early I think you know bringing that up to to patients on a level that makes sense we've talked about maybe you know teaching an old dog new tricks, I think it might help patients understand why do we talk about systemic therapies earlier on in disease. I mean obviously sometimes we're limited in how some of these medications are approved by the FDA, but progression right, you know, of certain conditions and even as progression that memory component you know of the immune system it's powerful you know to really lead to disease that could be potentially worsening or like you said harder to rein in down the line. So I think explaining that to patients is helpful where you know I get it patients are going to be reluctant right to do some of these systemic therapies, whether it's just the thought of being on something more lifelong or long term, maybe they are afraid of injections, maybe they're intimidated by side effects potentially so I think if we really explain to them here's the rationale like this is the reason why because your immune system once it kicks in and you've had this condition longer, your immune system is really hard to convince to go back to a normal state but if we catch it early enough, you know, we can maybe persuade it a little bit faster to come back to baseline and give you better control over your skin condition. So love that you highlight that memory part but and I definitely think important for both providers and the patients to get that concept and I think we can intervene earlier with better outcomes potentially for patients as well. But with the remission Joe, one of the things love the concept love where we're headed with it but I think people are worried about will remission really mean remission for me, right? Because we know inflammatory disease is very well impacted by the things around us stress, maybe even a genetic component we've talked about the epigenetic component but also you know people wonder about other triggers that could override remission. So I wanted to get your thoughts on that and kind of see how you feel like we might handle that in kind of this new era of how we treat inflammatory skin conditions.
SPEAKER_02For sure I think all of the things that you just talked about they're so important when we think about the patient as a whole right so we have genetics stress environment they all play a role together and I kind of think about this in terms of this is an analogy I use for my patients because I'm a poker player so you know I use a poker analogy here. Genetics is kind of like that starting hand that you're dealt. Okay so on you know you're you inherit them from your parents so unless you change your parents you're not going to change your genetics here. For instance there's a genetic variant in psoriasis called HLA C W6. If you inherit that genetic variant your risk of developing psoriasis off the bat is already 20 times higher than someone without that genetic variant. Not 20% higher 20 times higher so for eczema there are similar mutations we talked about phagrand a little bit and those are the hand that that's the hand you inherit. The epigenetics is kind of like that environment around the poker table who's sitting next to you, what their cars look like, you know whether the room on that day is loud or calm, you know, aggressive or reserved that's the environment and the environment Really can rewrite how your genes get expressed. Chronic inflammation, we know we talked a little bit about epigenetic scarring as well. You know, that's where the epigenetics come in. Depends on the environment around you. Now we just talked about a little bit about the triggers as well. Triggers are kind of like that cards on the table that get flipped over. Those are the specific things that can really modify the way that your genetics and your epigenetics interact to cause disease, right? So we know there are specific triggers for patients. Stress probably being the most powerful one. Over half of psoriasis patients identify stress as one of the triggers. Remember that patient I talked about earlier, you know, the accountant in Pittsburgh, every year around March, April, when that and when they get really busy, start getting the flare of psoriasis. We know stress is a big trigger for that patient and for a lot of other patients I see in my clinic as well. Now, the other kind of major triggers, we know infection being one of them for both psoriasis and eczema. Diet is also a big trigger. There was a lot of recent publications around specifically, you know, highly inflammatory diets, high in processed foods, high in your saturated fats, you know, sugars, salts that can really tip the immune balance as well. And there was a trial that was just published in one of our premier dermatology journals, Jamma Dermatology, that looked at Mediterranean diet in psoriasis and some of our inflammatory skin diseases in particular that showed significant improvement. All of these, you know, are not replacements for medication, but they are real kind of modifiable factors that belong in the same conversation.
Regulatory T Cells As Firefighters
SPEAKER_00Well, and and I think that's what people would think of maybe remission is going to be perfect, but you and I know there are things that can override that state. And all the things you just talked about are great examples of this. So I think that's the one thing we have to again caution, you know, patients to say, yes, we can potentially provide this, but there could be times where things kind of go off, you know, and then there's a little, you know, blip, if you will, on the radar where things might flare up. And they're just things that are sometimes out of our control. But one thing that may be working for controlling, you know, I think disease more is this concept of T regs. And a lot of people might be other, what the heck are T regs? So I was gonna have you come on that just briefly, you know, what are they? What are their potential role? Uh, you know, potentially the future, you know, as we look for psoriasis. We've kind of talked briefly sort of about this, but I wanted you to dive in just a little bit deeper in our last few minutes here.
SPEAKER_02Of course. So we've been talking about the fire analogy, the bonfire this entire time. So let's stay consistent with the fire analogy here. So your regulatory T cells are kind of like the firefighters in your body. Okay, so their entire job is to show up when the immune system has gone a little bit too far and you're getting this active inflammation. And these regulatory T cells, they basically they're for the firefighters, they show up, they calm things down, prevent the building from burning down. This is actually a really timely topic, Shannon, because as you know, you know, 2025, this most recent Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology, just went to three scientists for their roles in discovering regulatory T cells. So this is one of the hottest areas in all of medicine right now. Here's the key number for a disease like psoriasis. In a healthy person, your regulatory T cells suppress inflammation with about 94% efficiency. In psoriasis patients, most regulatory T cells, their efficiency is around 70%. So that 24% gap, that's that disease process right there. The firefighters, the cells are there, they're just not doing their job properly, and that's what's causing this highly inflammatory state. So then, of course, the research question here becomes can we train these firefighting cells, these regulatory T cells, to actually uh target disease a little bit better? So some of these studies are looking at using low doses of interleukin 2. Interleukin 2 is this molecule that's kind of like the food source for our regulatory T cells. A very small dose of it can preferentially stimulate these regulatory T cells without really stimulating the rest of your immune system. So there are studies in both psoriasis and eczema with pretty good and promising early results with stimulation of uh regulatory T cells. Other companies are looking at things like engineered peptides and these nanoparticles, basically uh particles to try to reprogram your immune cells toward a more peacekeeping role. And these can be delivered via very novel mechanisms as well, directly to the spots that are inflamed.
Pitfalls Like Access And Stopping
SPEAKER_00I mean, that's exciting. You have firefighter cells that are going rogue and we're correcting them. So I think that's gonna be exciting for how we, you know, really get those back in check with the technology that's available and what that's gonna mean too with the whole concept of remission. I mean, time will tell, but we're headed in the right direction. You know, if you think of remission, you know, you know, I just in short kind of what's sweet to end this for us. You know, do you feel like it's really possible? And secondarily, what do you think are the pitfalls of remission?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, Shannon, I I think not only is remission possible, but it should be our goal. And I kind of take a step back and really think about how far we've already come in terms of treatments for our chronic inflammatory skin diseases, right? 10, 15 years ago in psoriasis and eczema, if a patient came back into clinic, you know, at their follow-up and they were 50% better, we were happy with that. You know, so we were happy with any kind of improvement. Nowadays, and you know, I tell all my patients this as well as my colleagues, my goal is 100% complete clearance of their skin. You know, if they're coming back in, they're still flaring, they're still active, you know, I'm not satisfied there. And I do think we have new biologic agents and JAC inhibitors that can get us to complete clearance. But I think over the next five to 10 years, Shannon, that conversation is really going to start shifting again, where clearance is not gonna be enough for our patients. Our goal really will be more sustained remission, whether it's on treatment remission or off-treat off-therapy remission. That should be our next kind of the next frontier that we're targeting. And I do think, you know, we're well on our way there. We can already see some of the early signs of medications, whether with some of these withdrawal data, whether with different dosing regimen. I really think that, you know, we're we're well on our way there. Now, in terms of the second part of your question about pitfalls, I think with any advances in therapy, you know, one of the main pitfalls is really thinking about this notion of access to care, right? If we have uh if remission becomes achievable for our patients, we need to be able to make sure that we get that right medication at the right time, the right dosing to the right patient. Okay, so and a lot of that is going to come down to better coverage for our patients, you know, access to these novel therapeutics. I think that second part, which you know, we've alluded to a couple of times in this uh discussion as well, is you know, I really hesitate uh because I don't want a patient to hear this podcast and think, look, remission might be possible and stop their medication the next day. So I think you know it's really important for this to be a discussion with your dermatology provider. You know, whether it's psoriasis, eczema, HS, um, or any of your other inflammatory skin diseases, I really think you know we're well on our way to finding a way, whether it's to stay on treatment or off of therapy, to get to that remitive state. Um, but this has to be a team effort with you know our scientists, with the dermatology providers, and with the patient.
SPEAKER_00Well, it's an exciting time to be in dermatology, Joe. I think you would agree. I mean, we've just got great options, and I'm excited to see what the future holds. Like you said, I think remission is going to be our goal. And it's just was a novel concept years ago. And to think we're here, how incredible, right? That we're here for our patients. Well, I want to thank you so much for coming on the podcast, Joe. It's been great. I think you've really put this in perspective for all of us.
SPEAKER_02Thank you, Shannon. The pleasure's mine.
SPEAKER_00Likewise. And stay tuned for the next episode of Dermotrotter Don't Swear About Skin Care.
SPEAKER_01Thanks for listening to Dermotter. For more about skincare, visit dermitter.com. Don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share this podcast with anyone who needs a little skincare sanity. Until next time, stay skin smart.
