Wearing our favorite swimwear to the beach. Putting on a singlet for a jog at the Botanic Gardens. Dressing up in summer wear for a walk down the shopping alley. While most of us can do these things without much thought, many psoriasis patients are unable to do these easily. With rashes of salmon pink and silvery flakes occurring on prominent parts of their body, public attention is drawn easily to patients with psoriasis. Patients often face social ostracism as many people believe that psoriasis is infectious and heritable. Public awareness of the condition can greatly help improve these patients’ lives

A few of us who participated in World Psoriasis Day

18^th October 2014 was the day that World Psoriasis Day was cerebrated in Singapore.   The DermSIG medical students from Duke NUS Graduate Medical School and NUS Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine joined other healthcare professionals and patients to better understand the perspectives of the public on the condition.

Eczema is a chronic itchy skin condition. In most circumstances, it is not fatal and does not result in significant physical morbidity. This has often led the condition to be branded as “benign” by both the medical community as well as the general public. But in reality, it has been shown to have great negative impact on the quality of life of patients, especially when it’s inadequately controlled.

The appearance of lesions as red, oozy and angry makes patients appear to have an infectious condition. This leads to social isolation, teasing and bullying by peers and acquaintances, which may inhibit their activity, play, and social interactions that are fundamental to their development.

To allow patients a chance to better understand their condition, support groups for the condition have been formed by the KKH Dermatology Service and National Skin Centre. The support group conducts biannual Eczema camps. In November 2014, students from the Duke-NUS Dermatology Interest Group joined tertiary students from SMU, NUS Yong Loo Lin and La Salle College of the Arts to organize and help out at the event, held at two locations in Singapore.

Did you happen to see Angry birds plush toys when you visited the TeamLEAD room? If you do, they actually belong to our students from the Class of 2015! Previously, we posted a short blog entry containing photos of the Class of 2015 together with Professor Hwang Nian-Chih. As seen above, the students also took some photos with Dr. Doyle Graham, the course director for Body and Disease.

If you follow our Youtube Channel, Dr. Doyle Graham was featured in our TeamLEAD video, where he provides an overview of the TeamLEAD approach here at Duke-NUS and how it is an effective way for medical students to learn. You can read more about TeamLEAD here and here.

Credit: Photos by Olivia Tan

For the final pharmacology tutorial, the class of 2015 came to class dressed in bow ties, bowed hairbands and ribbons. This was to honor Professor Hwang Nian-Chih, who is always perfectly donning a bow tie. Thanks to Andrew Chou for sending us this tip!

Credit: Photos by Andrew Chou