Photochemotherapy for vitiligo: Seven years' experience at a University Hospital

Photochemotherapy has been the most successful treatment of vitiligo to date. In this study we tried to evaluate the efficacy, safety and patient acceptability of photochemotherapy (PUVA, or psoralen and ultraviolet A, therapy) for vitiligo patients treated in King Khalid University Hospital over the period of 1987-1994. The treatment success strongly depended on the number of treatments. More than 75% repigmentation was achieved in 42% of the patients who received 100 to more than 200 treatments. Unfortunately, however, only 27% of the patients received this number of treatments. Reasons for the failure of our patients to continue treatment to successful repigmentation, and recommendations for correction of this failure, are discussed.