By By Our Correspondent
Skin is one of the most precious gifts of God and one should consult only specialized doctors for its treatment, avoiding self-medication and quacks.
A group of renowned dermatologists from the city said this while speaking on a seminar “Attractive Skin: Necessary for Everyone”, which was arranged by Mir Khalil ur Rehman Memorial Society in collaboration with Pakistan Association of Dermatologists at a local hotel here on Wednesday.
Speaking on the occasion, the chief guest of the seminar, Professor Dr. Javed Akram, Principal Allama Iqbal Medical College, said one should never let any doctor or quack invade one’s skin unnecessarily. He said unnecessary injections, drips, tattoos and piercing of the skin should always be avoided.
He said skin was the largest organ of the human body and it helps maintain the thermostat of body. He said it was unfortunate that we did not have any specialized centre for dermatology in the country.
He said there were 400 skin specialists in the country against a total population of 160 million, adding there should have been at least 40, 000 skin specialists in the country according to international standard.
He said skin regeneration treatment had started in the country in certain laboratories and, in this regard, skin care centre had been established in Jinnah Hospital with the collaboration of a German NGO, GTZ. He said the centre treated the victims of domestic violence. He said he and his team were going to establish a Dermatology Centre where all kinds of specialized doctors of the skin would be available.
Professor Doctor Jehangir, Head of Dermatology, Jinnah Hospital, said Pakistan Association of Dermatology had been working for last thirty years, holding conferences every year in different cities. He said skin was a kind of social passport for every person who wanted to have healthy relations with others. He said there were many misconceptions about skin and its diseases in the society.
Talking about a serious skin disease Axema, he said it could attack a person at any stage of his life. It could re-emerge even if it was cured at one stage, he added.
The patient with the skin disease has itching which aggravates when skin is scratched, he said, adding, later on, there are water blisters on the skin and finally the skin becomes swollen on that particular area.
He said Axema was not contagious and the patient should not be isolated.
Professor Dr. Tariq Zaman said, at the age of 14-15, pimples appeared on the face of an adolescent, be it boy or girl, and this was due to hormonal changes in the body. He said proper and regular treatment of pimples or acne was necessary so that a person would not have scars or blemishes throughout his or her life. He said there were different kinds of acne and its treatment also differed in various patients.
Professor Dr. Tariq Bashir said extra hair on the skin was due to hormonal imbalances within the body and it was not only a cosmetic problem. He said waxing, threading and bleaching were only short-term solutions, and for only fine hair, not stiff hair.
Professor Dr. Ejaz Hussain said a human body had 5 million hair and only head had one hundred thousand hair. Different people had different kinds of hair and a balanced diet was necessary for the health of every kind of hair, he added.
He said the ladies and gents who resort to dieting should take proper amount of protein in their daily routine, otherwise, there were high chances that they would have the problem of falling hair.
He said 2-3 times shampoo was necessary for the healthy hair in a week. He said 50pc people in the world had dandruff but it was not at all a serious disease. He said antifungal shampoo could be a treatment for dandruff.
Dr Lamees Mehmood Malik said not only ladies but men were also very conscious about their skin. She said the use of different kinds of creams and mixture of creams could be very dangerous for the skin in the long term. She said the skin colour, naturally, depended upon a pigment Melanin and the people living in Africa had a large amount of it because they encountered more intense kind of weather and sunlight as compared with other areas.
She said Europeans had lesser amount of melanin because their weather was mild and pleasant.
She said white colour was not necessarily an insignia of beauty, rather, one should have healthy skin, be it black or white. At the end, MKRMS chairman Wasif Nagi thanked the speakers.