Struggling with ear canal psoriasis
Posted Thu 20 Mar 2025 12.27 by Genmaicha (edited Thu 20 Mar 2025 12.28 by Genmaicha)
A brief history: I don't have psoriasis anywhere else on my body except in my ear canals and occasionally a little on the outside of the ear. I developed it less than 2 years ago, so it was a surprise!
Now I'm in the unfortunate situation of going to see the ENT consultant every 4–6 weeks so he can suction out the skin debris in my canals. All the dermatologist gave me was steroid drops (betamethasone). I have calcipotriol and tacrolimus ointments which help a little but can't reach deep inside the canals.
Nothing is really helping and it feels like an ongoing regime of steroid drops and microsuction is just masking the problem. I've tried oils like olive oil over several days but that made my blocked ears worse.
I broke down in tears at the ENT's this morning because it's really getting to me. I just want my ears back how they were. Perfectly normal for 30 odd years until this happened.
My question is has anyone else suffered with this and what treatments were you given? Thank you.
P.S. I'm on a biologic (adalimumab) for a joint condition, not psoriatic arthritis, but that hasn't helped.
Posted Thu 20 Mar 2025 16.35 by SheilaM
I had bad attack of my psoriasis last year and ended up in my ears, went deaf and had to be suctioned, use olive oil drops to keep ears moist once a week to keep moist. If on outer ear I put whatever cream I’m using at the time using dovebet ointment at moment and apply very sparingly. Good luck hope you can clear
Posted Thu 20 Mar 2025 19.35 by Peterb (edited Thu 20 Mar 2025 19.40 by Peterb)
I am now coming up to 80 and have had psoriasis since I was 27 years of age. It comes and go sometimes very badly. Over the last year or so I have had a lot of issues with my ears assuming it’s wax and treating it accordingly based on what you have said it could easily be psoriasis ideep in my ears so I’m going to get it checked out when I see my ear Doctor in around two weeks time. Thanks for the info.
Posted Mon 31 Mar 2025 11.57 by OhNo_NotAgain? (edited Tue 1 Apr 2025 10.49 by OhNo_NotAgain?)
About 10 years ago I was getting quite a lot of dry-skin and irritation in my ear canal, which seemed to be to be psoriasis (which I had first discovered when it covered my entire body starting in 1980).
I had tried smearing a small amount of steroid ointment inside the ear using my little finger, but could not seem to get as deep as I felt I needed to. I did not want to try and use a q-tip in case that caused more problems.
I remember reading somewhere online about using steroid Nasal drops, I think it might have been Fluticasone propionate. My memory is not so good now, but it was definitely something-propionate. It was available over-the-counter back then, so I bought a small bottle from boots..
I spoke to my GP at the time (who was fairly clued-up on psoriasis and generally very helpful), and he agreed I could safely try the drops in my ears.
The cleared the psoriasis or whatever it was in the ears after applying 2 drops twice a day for 3 days. A few months later I used it again, the same way.
Maybe check with a GP that there is nothing else going on, before trying this. But for my psoriasis it helped me a lot.
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