How To Treat And Manage Vitiligo

Surgery

Vitiligo is a stubborn, capricious disease, and not everyone will respond to less invasive treatments. When other therapies fail, there is surgery that aims to restore normal skin color to patients. For smaller areas of vitiligo, a surgical procedure called skin grafting may be performed, in which pigmented skin is removed in tiny pieces and then attached to areas of the skin with vitiligo. In another similar procedure, blister grafting, the surgeon uses a suction device to create small blisters on normal skin. The tops of these blisters are then lifted off and transplanted to skin with vitiligo. The results of these procedures are difficult to predict. They can result in a spotty appearance, rather than the smoothly colored look of normal skin, and there is also the risk of infection and scarring. Either or both types of surgery may fail altogether.