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Comment by matthewtse | Hacker News Reader

It's utterly amazing to hear of another group of sufferers who are the beneficiaries of modern miracle medicine.

Personally, I suffered from an extreme case of eczema my whole life, which left me effectively a disabled person. Although eczema doesn't have a significant effect on life-expectancy, there wasn't all that much to live for, and I had basically given up on being able to do normal things like exercise or travel.

So it was very surprising to "hear the good news" that Dupixent(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dupilumab) was being released in 2017 (also fast tracked as a breakthrough therapy), I got on it, and it's made me 98% a normal person.

Here's to continued funding for new miracle medicines to help more groups of sufferers.

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I know someone with relatively bad eczema and I believe you when you say you believed you had nothing to live for. I’m genuinely glad you were relieved of that. It seems like it can be terrible to live with.

A sincere thank you :)

Yes, the worst was a period of months when I was effectively a burn victim (>70% of body with severe bleeding sores, and fully bedridden). The worst part was that, unlike with a burn victim, it wasn't clear to me if I would ever heal out of it.

Luckily it got a bit better to at least get out of bed, and then Dupixent came along a few years later.

Oh god. That’s virtually incomprehensible to me. I woke up feeling a little down today, but I’m realizing I should be a lot more grateful for my healthy past and present. A little cold doesn’t matter in the scheme of things.

TBH, it's exactly the same for me too.

It's really amazing how much the human mind adapts both upwards and downwards. These days I find myself sad about the same kinds of stuff as everyone around me (money, relationships, etc.), and I honestly don't think about where I was just ~6 years ago.

But in really down times, I do find it a mental panacea to just remind myself about my past which pretty much instantly solves any feelings of depression.

I suffer from allergies/hay fever for 3-4 months of the year. When I was a teen I used to take cetrizine which would sort of help, but it left me feeling groggy and tired a lot, which was in some cases worse than the allergies.

Fexofenadine became available OTC available in the UK in 2020 and the pharmacist suggested I try it. I don't even carry tissues anymore during the summer months. If I ever miss a day though, it's immediately obvious.

It's not life or death, or anything like it, but it's a wild improvement in my qualify of life.

You might also want to consider immunotherapy - it’s quite effective for most and can offer long term desensitisation. Available both privately and via NHS (for severe pollen allergies) in the UK.

Immunotherapy is not a silver bullet, and it can take years before any positive improvement is noticed. There's a not insignificant time sink involved with going to the doctor twice a week. And the immunity doesn't last forever.

Yeah my symptoms aren't anywhere near bad enough to warrant even a monthly trip to the doctor. I was miserable for 3 months of the year either sleepy or sneezing and scratching, now I have a daily pill for £10/month for the summer.

You don’t need to see a doctor regularly with sublingual immunotherapy. It’s just a couple of drops or a tablet once a day for 5 mins. No side effects (it’s effectively microdosing the allergen to desensitise the body)

I'm in the UK, doesn't appear to be an NHS treatment. Given the choice between $150/month for a tablet once a day (immunotherapy) or free for a tablet once a day (fexofenadine - my pharmacist can write a prescription for it and I live in Scotland where prescriptions are free), I'll take free thanks!

I find it incredibly inspiring and encouraging to see medicine advance.

Every new cure discovered also frees up resources to perform more research on the remaining deadly diseases.

Cancer, of course, being the big one.

Dupixent rocks! If you ever get sick of infections, it sounds like JAK inhibitors have opened the door to daily-pill eczema treatments too.

> If you ever get sick of infections

I assume you meant "injections" :)

For the value that Dupixent provides for me (effectively infinite), I'd do just about anything. So the injections don't bother me at all.

Though injections do make international travel a bit more complicated. Daily-pill eczema treatments would definitely be more convenient in that respect!

Ha! Autocorrect got me, I did mean to say injections ^_^;;

Although tbh I have had several nasty infections from then-untreated eczema...

I was actually on Dupixent for a while and I was one of the non-responders, so my derm put me on a JAK inhibitor daily pill.

The convenience is offset by higher risk of side effects, though luckily I seem to have avoided those.

The pills really seem to be the solution for me.

My eczema had gotten pretty bad in recent years, and much of what you said resonates with me, though I don't think I ever got to the point of being effectively disabled.

My skin is like 90% smooth now with some last stubborn patches, but I'm hoping with time they and the residual scarring will start to disappear.

Sorry to hear you're a non-responder to Dupixent. But really glad you found a different pill that seems to work!

I use to worry that my body would someday stop responding to Dupixent, and my whole life would suddenly crash down around me. But luckily that hasn't happened yet, and with all the monoclonal antibodies in the pipelines, I'm actually confident medicine will be able to outpace my condition.

Dupixent has completely changed my quality of life too. I’d effectively given up on ever feeling normal again. Cheers to science!

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