Your immune system is designed to fight bacteria and disease. But when you have an autoimmune disorder, your immune system mistakenly attacks your healthy cells, making you sick. These attacks can occur in various areas of the body: Common autoimmune disorders include rheumatoid arthritis, Type I diabetes, lupus, celiac disease and multiple sclerosis. While all these disorders have an impact on different organs or tissues throughout the body, some autoimmune disorders affect your skin directly. For instance, skin conditions such as scleroderma, psoriasis, dermatomyositis and epidermolysis bullosa are all autoimmune disorders. Like many medical conditions, treating autoimmune skin conditions sometimes requires trial and error. When our patients are dealing with these conditions, we work closely with them to determine whether the treatment is working or …

Everyone loses 50 to 100 hairs per day—but some of us are losing way more than that. While hair loss is somewhat expected for men as they grow older, it’s also quite common in women, according to the American Academy for Dermatology. And the causes are varied: Genetics, aging, hormones, stressful events, nutrition and certain medications or diseases can contribute to hair loss. While some people are comfortable with baldness, most people prefer to keep some hair on their heads. But the good news is that just because you experience hair loss doesn’t mean anybody has to know about it. Dermatologists can often help you determine the cause of your hair loss and help you develop a solution to reverse the condition and help you …