Business Insight Presented by Arlington Dermatology Stress and the body I often get questions from patients about their stressful life influencing their health. Some patients make statements straight forward: "...I was fine, but I lost my job, got very stressed, and my eczema started flaring...' So, is stress causing eczema? Or psoriasis? Yes and no. Let's elaborate on this topic. Stress affects everybody and is impossible to be eliminated. Historically, stress and stressors have been changing. In pre-historic times, our human predecessors were stressed because they were afraid of being eaten by wild animals. During war times, people underwent tremendous stress due to hunger, abuse, and fear of death. These days, we get stressed by insecurities, new diseases, being overwhelmed by the speed of life. Different stressors, different environment, create different reactions. We get headaches, chest pains, upset stomachs, sleeplessness as results of chronic stress. Our mood changes under stress and we often react with anger, irritation, anxiety, or lack of focus and attention. None of with those diseases also appear to have these symptoms or reactions are good, at least they are not good when experienced for a prolonged period. Acute stress may be good for us. It mobilizes our mind and body to respond to any 'attackers', short-term stressors. We can say we put all our body's forces together and we get rid of any potential problem affecting us. But when it happens day after day, week after week, we identify genetically it as a chronic stress, and this is when we suddenly expressed themselves as a simply cannot function the way we should. Medically talking, psychological stress like multiple sclerosis or lupus. Individuals difficulty regulating and controlling their immune responses after exposure to stressors. And finally, it has been observed that chronic stress is responsible for re activation of latent viruses. All the above, medical and life-related circumstances associated with outcomes of chronic stress, are not positive for our bodies. The diseases we may carry and experienced, never has been implicated in altered immune functioning in many diseases. Stress induces chronic immune activation and altered health outcomes that resemble those diseases such as psoriasis or atopic reaction to stressors and many patients name this association 'a cause'. Let's make it clear: stress does not cause diseases directly. Further, due to a variety of individual responses, different people will react in a different way to the same stressor. But indirectly, chronic stress causes our bodies to weaken their immune seen in chronic inflammatory responses and become more susceptible to create an outcome known as a disease. And, as some of us are pre-disposed genetically to some diseases, whatever our genetic disposition is, it will come out as a dermatitis. Altered immune function can lead to exacerbated symptoms of both physical and psychological illnesses. High levels of proinflammatory cytokines resulting from stress have recently been suspected in the etiology of schizophrenia. Chronic stress has been shown to enhance reaction to the stressor. risk for developing autoimmune disease Michael Bukhalo, MD Arlington Dermatology 5301 Keystone Court Rolling Meadows, IL 60008 Tel. 847 392 5440 | www.arlingtondermatology.net Business Insight Presented by Arlington Dermatology Stress and the body I often get questions from patients about their stressful life influencing their health. Some patients make statements straight forward: "...I was fine, but I lost my job, got very stressed, and my eczema started flaring...' So, is stress causing eczema? Or psoriasis? Yes and no. Let's elaborate on this topic. Stress affects everybody and is impossible to be eliminated. Historically, stress and stressors have been changing. In pre-historic times, our human predecessors were stressed because they were afraid of being eaten by wild animals. During war times, people underwent tremendous stress due to hunger, abuse, and fear of death. These days, we get stressed by insecurities, new diseases, being overwhelmed by the speed of life. Different stressors, different environment, create different reactions. We get headaches, chest pains, upset stomachs, sleeplessness as results of chronic stress. Our mood changes under stress and we often react with anger, irritation, anxiety, or lack of focus and attention. None of with those diseases also appear to have these symptoms or reactions are good, at least they are not good when experienced for a prolonged period. Acute stress may be good for us. It mobilizes our mind and body to respond to any 'attackers', short-term stressors. We can say we put all our body's forces together and we get rid of any potential problem affecting us. But when it happens day after day, week after week, we identify genetically it as a chronic stress, and this is when we suddenly expressed themselves as a simply cannot function the way we should. Medically talking, psychological stress like multiple sclerosis or lupus. Individuals difficulty regulating and controlling their immune responses after exposure to stressors. And finally, it has been observed that chronic stress is responsible for re activation of latent viruses. All the above, medical and life-related circumstances associated with outcomes of chronic stress, are not positive for our bodies. The diseases we may carry and experienced, never has been implicated in altered immune functioning in many diseases. Stress induces chronic immune activation and altered health outcomes that resemble those diseases such as psoriasis or atopic reaction to stressors and many patients name this association 'a cause'. Let's make it clear: stress does not cause diseases directly. Further, due to a variety of individual responses, different people will react in a different way to the same stressor. But indirectly, chronic stress causes our bodies to weaken their immune seen in chronic inflammatory responses and become more susceptible to create an outcome known as a disease. And, as some of us are pre-disposed genetically to some diseases, whatever our genetic disposition is, it will come out as a dermatitis. Altered immune function can lead to exacerbated symptoms of both physical and psychological illnesses. High levels of proinflammatory cytokines resulting from stress have recently been suspected in the etiology of schizophrenia. Chronic stress has been shown to enhance reaction to the stressor. risk for developing autoimmune disease Michael Bukhalo, MD Arlington Dermatology 5301 Keystone Court Rolling Meadows, IL 60008 Tel. 847 392 5440 | www.arlingtondermatology.net