Vitiligo is a rare skin condition that causes colorless skin lesions due to a lack of melanin. It can lead to secondary medical and psychiatric conditions, and there are two types: Non-Segmental Vitiligo (NSV) and Segmental Vitiligo (SV). While there is no cure, treatments aim to mask the symptoms.
Vitiligo is a skin condition that affects less than 1% of people worldwide. Vitiligo sufferers experience an absence of melanin, the pigment that gives skin its color. In general, people who have darker skin have more melanin, lighter skinned individuals have a lower concentration of the pigment, and a vitiligo lesion is virtually devoid of melanin. A person diagnosed with this rare disorder will most commonly experience Vitiligo symptoms related to colorless skin lesions. These lesions can exist anywhere on the body, although Vitiligo will most likely occur around a body orifice and are likely to be located symmetrically on a person’s body.
Vitiligo symptoms usually start as very small patches but tend to gradually increase in size. Their forms are also known to be dynamic, sometimes evolving into very different forms than they were when they originated. In addition to the physical symptoms of Vitiligo, this disease commonly brings with it a number of secondary medical and psychiatric conditions, largely due to the disfiguring nature of the disease. Depression and many anxiety disorders are among the secondary medical problems that could follow a Vitiligo diagnosis.
There are mainly two types of Vitiligo: Non-Segmental Vitiligo (NSV) and Segmental Vitiligo (SV). Non-segmental Vitiligo is the more common of the two and although it includes many subtypes, this classification can be generalized as having lesions that are symmetrical, cover a large portion of the body, and have no specific age of onset. Segmental vitiligo typically spreads more rapidly, occurs during adolescence, and is not necessarily in a symmetrical pattern. Besides that, SV could occur in small and localized regions, which contrasts with NSV as NSV covers a large area of the body.
While the precise cause of Vitiligo is unknown, many experts theorize that its origins are autoimmune, neural, viral, or genetic in nature. Melanin is produced by cells called melanocytes. When these cells fail, become dysfunctional or destroyed, the human body’s ability to maintain certain levels of melanin is also affected, resulting in albino skin lesions in seemingly arbitrary locations. This disease affects all races, although it is more evident in those with dark skin, due to the contrasting nature of the lesions against their complexion.
There is no cure for this disease, although there are a number of treatments intended to mask the symptoms of Vitiligo. Most of these procedures aim to camouflage the legions. This can be done in a number of ways, including applying sunscreen to unaffected areas to keep them as pale as possible, dyeing the affected areas, or bleaching the unaffected areas in an effort to make the skin more even in color.
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