Dialysis for Psoriasis

To the Editor.— Buselmeier et al (240:1270, 1978) have described a psoriatic patient who responded to dialytic therapy. They concluded that "the apparent success of dialysis in treatment of intractable psoriasis... may indicate application of this mode of therapy to psoriatic patients who do not have renal failure." Since the publication of their article, there have appeared in the literature additional reports of successful dialytic therapy in psoriatic patients with normal kidney function.1-4Impressed by this accumulating evidence of the possible efficacy of this mode of therapy, we undertook to apply it in three of our most refractory cases of psoriasis. These patients were subjected to 24-hour peritoneal dialysis (one-hour exchange), weekly for a total of ten weeks each. After one month of follow-up, we noted the following observations: There was an obvious improvement in all three patients, with 80% clearing of the skin lesions in one patient