Act One

Act Two

Act Three

Skin has always told stories. For thousands of years, those whose skin behaved differently — scaling, thickening, inflaming — were feared, isolated, and misunderstood. Psoriasis was long lumped together with leprosy, its sufferers cast out rather than cared for.

It would take centuries before medicine began to separate these conditions, and longer still before we understood what was really happening beneath the surface. Psoriasis is not an infection, not a curse, not a failure of hygiene. It is the immune system turning on itself, a complex, chronic inflammatory disease that affects not just skin but joints, confidence, and quality of life. It touches roughly 2-3% of the population, and for many it is a lifelong companion.

Today we have a clinical dermatologist and a dermatopathologist to help us understand what psoriasis looks like to the clinician, what it reveals under the microscope, and how our understanding of its immunological roots has transformed the way we treat it.

This is the story of psoriasis.

Our Special Guests:

Associate Professor Laura Scardamaglia, a Consultant Dermatologist, a Fellow of the Australasian College of Dermatology, and Clinical Associate Professor at the University of Melbourne.

Dr Grace Liu is an Anatomical Pathologist with Histopath in Sydney, Australia.

Listen:

This Medical Life podcast is available on all podcasting services and Spotify. Help support us on our donation page.

Skin has always told stories. For thousands of years, those whose skin behaved differently &mdash; scaling, thickening, inflaming &mdash; were feared, isolated, and misunderstood. Psoriasis was long lumped together with leprosy, its sufferers cast out rather than cared for.
It would take centuries before medicine began to separate these conditions, and longer still before we understood what was really happening beneath the surface. Psoriasis is not an infection, not a curse, not a failure of hygiene. It is the immune system turning on itself, a complex, chronic inflammatory disease that affects not just skin but joints, confidence, and quality of life. It touches roughly 2-3% of the population, and for many it is a lifelong companion.
Today we have a clinical dermatologist and a dermatopathologist to help us understand what psoriasis looks like to the clinician, what it reveals under the microscope, and how our understanding of its immunological roots has transformed the way we treat it.
This is the story of psoriasis.
Our Special Guests:
Associate Professor Laura Scardamaglia, a Consultant Dermatologist, a Fellow of the Australasian College of Dermatology, and Clinical Associate Professor at the University of Melbourne.
Dr Grace Liu is an Anatomical Pathologist with Histopath in Sydney, Australia.
Listen:
This Medical Life podcast is available on all podcasting services and Spotify.&nbsp;<a href="https://thismedicallife.com.au/buy/donation">Help support us on our donation page</a>.

Welcome to the This Medical Life podcast. Our mission is to share stories about the triumphs and tragedies of diseases and illnesses from ancient times up until what we know today. It is about those scientific and medical minds who came before us and how, every single day, we stand on the shoulders of giants. This is a podcast about the stories of medicine.


Hosted by Dr. Travis Brown and Steve Davis, our target audience is General Practitioners, medical students, and other health professionals. We hope to educate, inspire and celebrate those who choose to care for others in their profession. From experience, we know that our audience extends beyond these fields and would like to welcome anyone to listen. The stories of those who came before us are nothing short of remarkable and we hope you enjoy them as much as we do.

Production by Tim Whiffen

Design by Tom Buzz