Does UV Light Treat Vitiligo ?

 

There are many ways to treat the vitiligo in clinical. Here are some common ways in treating vitiligo. One of the methods is the ultraviolet-light irradiation method. But use the UV light may not be the best way to treat the vitiligo.

The ultraviolet light is on the lateral side of the purple light at the spectrum, it is also called ultraviolet ray. The sunshine includes amount of ultraviolet ray. According to the theory of ultraviolet irradiation, it could increase the sensitivity of the pigment cells. It’s because the pigment cells can produce more melanin, it is one of the traditional treatment methods. At present, according to the clinical applications, this method may not benefit vitiligo treatment. There are two reasons of it.

The first reason is excessive ultraviolet light may damage to the human body. The second reason is the defense system will decline when we fall in sick. So we think the vitiligo patient should reduce or avoid the irradiation of the ultraviolet light. Everyone will receive some ultraviolet light more or less from the daily sunshine. But it doesn’t damage the normal tissue. It’s because of we have the protective mechanism on body surface, and the melancyte produce and secrete the melanin to prevent the ultraviolet light irradiation. When the light irradiation time is delayed and the amount of the light will increase. The pigment cells will response compensatory at the same time, the melanin production will increase according to the time and intensity of the light. So the skin will become black very obviously, it aims to prevent and reduce the irradiation of the ultraviolet light, protect the organic tissue from damaging. The organism of the body is different from the normal when we are falling sick. Most of the melancytes on skin will be damaged in different degrees. Some of the cells’ function may even lose. the protection function also will decline.

So it is not good to use the UV light to treat the vitiligo. Because of too much UV light may damage the skin, and skin protection is weak when we fall in sick.