Skin Picking Disorder: You Might Have It And Not Even Know It!

If you think picking at a scar until it bleeds, waiting for it to heal, then picking it at it is normal and non-threatening, you might be wrong.While picking at skin is something almost everyone does, doing it so frequently and finding it difficult to resist the urge may be a different story altogether.

You might have a skin picking disorder and yet not know it, seeing that very few studies have been conducted about it. 

As reported by Yahoo News, a registered psychotherapist at  CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) Associates in Toronto, Eliza Burroughs, confirmed there is such a thing called Skin Picking Disorder. 

Burroughs explained that SPD is the recurrent picking of the skin, which damages the skin and leads to lesions. What sets apart someone with SPD from someone who occasionally picks at a scar or tugs a hangnail is the difficulty in decreasing the picking. 

People with SPD cannot last a day without picking at their skin or thinking about doing it. Those given with the SPD diagnosis are those who already tried several times to stop but cannot. As a result of picking, the person with SPD also experiences significant distress. 

Most of the time, a person with SPD is preoccupied with picking skin, thinking about picking skin, and trying to resist the urge to pick. "Commonly picked sites include face, arms and hands, although it can be anywhere on the body," Burroughs says. 

The expert added that more females have this condition. "It is unclear as to why this may be, however it may reflect treatment seeking behaviors based on gender or cultural attitudes as opposed to underlying biological differences between the genders," she says. "For instance, it is possible that men feel more embarrassment or shame in seeking treatment for a mental health condition or an appearance-related concern."

She however, claimed that people with SPD should not fret. The behaviour can be altered if a patient undergoes cognitive behaviour therapy. "This includes habit reversal training, and psychoeducation and strategies that target the thoughts and behaviours associated with SPD," she says.

Healio however reported that findings from a randomized clinical trial has found that N-acetylcysteine, an amino acid shown to restore extracellular glutamate concentration in the nucleus accumbens, can be an effective treatment for SPD.