Experiences with ACTH and cortisone in selected dermatoses.

Fifty patients with various kinds of skin diseases who were not adequately relieved by conventional therapy were treated with ACTH or cortisone given systemically. Almost all patients with disseminated neurodermatitis had dramatic initial response, but in only about half the cases was improvement maintained when use of the drugs was discontinued. It appeared that in other skin diseases, such as lupus erythematosus, scleroderma, psoriasis, dermatomyositis and pemphigus, while improvement may be noted for a time, relapse to the original state occurs after the treatment is stopped. In four cases of chronic discoid lupus erythematosus, although some improvement was observed when steroid therapy was given, the histologic pattern of biopsy material taken from the lesions after treatment still was characteristic of the disease.