Ever since he was a baby, Luke Brown has suffered from an agonising skin condition that has driven him to scratch until his skin becomes raw and inflamed.
The itchy rash that covered his body was so severe that, at times, the skin would split, creating weeping and oozing wounds.
The condition that blighted Luke‘s life was eczema – a chronic inflammatory condition that affects as many as eight million people in the UK.
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It typically triggers dry, itchy, scaly patches that can appear anywhere on the body.
Crucially, it cannot be cured.
For some patients, eczema can be a minor inconvenience. But for others, like Luke, it can make life miserable.
As a child, his eczema was so severe he was put in hospital and wrapped head to toe in thick tar-based dressings, his body effectively ‘mummified‘ to protect the skin and stop him tearing at it.
At school, he was subjected to cruel taunts – called ‘walking scab‘ and ‘human snow globe‘ because of the constant flaking of his skin.
Luke Brown, 37, credits his skin transformation with changes to his diet and skincare routine
Luke suffered an extreme reaction after he stopped applying topical steroid creams to treat his eczema last year
Moreover, steroid creams, prescribed to reduce eczema flare-ups, had little effect on Luke‘s skin.
‘I don’t think there has ever been a time I haven‘t felt self-conscious,‘ says Luke, now 37, from Southampton.
However, last year Luke, who runs a theatre company, finally found a solution: changing his diet.
A growing number of experts are now urging eczema patients to consider adapting their diet to manage the debilitating condition.
Luke says that he took steroid creams for years to tackle the skin problem, even though they only provided limited relief.
However, his recovery journey began last February when he decided, on the advice of a homoeopath, an alternative medicine practitioner, to quit the drugs.
Looking back, he now realises this decision was ‘dangerously naive‘.
Studies show that some patients who come off steroid creams after using them for long periods suffer distressing withdrawal side-effects.
And, in Luke‘s case, since he had been using the medication for so long, his symptoms were particularly severe.
At first, he says, it felt like a severe sunburn across his face and neck, before spreading rapidly across his body. The rash even reached his eyes, temporarily blinding him.
Over the following weeks, his condition escalated and he required hospital care, including steroid eye drops to restore his vision and treatment for a serious infection.
At its worst, Luke says he was unable to tolerate clothing and became housebound for months.
However, it was during this recovery period that his remarkable turnaround occurred.
Luke did some research online and found that many patients report that cutting down on sugar and gluten, found in dough-based foods such as pizza, seemed to help their symptoms.
So Luke decided to follow suit. The task wasn‘t an easy one.
‘Sugar is in everything – bread, sauces, even things you don‘t expect,‘ he says. ‘That was hard. But gluten was the one I kept coming back to.‘
At his lowest point, Luke was housebound for seven months – signed off work and unable even to wear clothing
By the end of last summer, Luke was almost unrecognisable – his eczema significantly improved
However, he noticed that during this period his eczema patches seemed to become less inflamed, itchy and red.
So he decided to be even stricter about his diet, completely cutting out any gluten, including bread, pasta, pizza and beer.
‘It was about the consistency,‘ he says.
‘If I stayed strict for a while, my skin would settle. If I slipped, I could feel it within hours.‘
The clearest example, he says, came after a period of strict avoidance.
‘After sticking to a gluten-free diet for a while, I ordered a pizza,‘ he says. ‘Within an hour, my stomach had swollen and the itching came on like a wave. It was like my body had switched back on.‘
Alongside these changes, he also began regularly drinking kefir – a fermented milk drink that is shown in studies to boost gut health and may affect the skin too.
He also began regularly applying a moisturising cream from the brand Skin: Genius, alongside occasionally using steroid creams when flare-ups occur.
By the end of last summer, he began to notice improvements.
‘My skin was looking better and I started to feel more like myself again,‘ he says.
Friends, he adds, barely recognised him when they next met.
‘They couldn‘t believe I was the same person.‘
Experts say that, for most patients, diet changes cannot cure eczema; however, they add that eating healthy will almost certainly improve symptoms.
‘Large population studies don’t support gluten as a universal trigger, but that doesn’t mean individuals don‘t experience genuine sensitivities,‘ says Dr Dev Patel, GP with a special interest in dermatology.
‘The important thing is not removing multiple food groups without supervision.‘
Dr Patel adds that reducing ultra-processed foods – those that contain artificial ingredients like ready meals and takeaways – as well as excess sugar, is likely to be broadly beneficial.
‘Even if it doesn‘t directly treat eczema, it supports overall inflammation and gut health.‘
Studies show, increasingly, that the gut and skin are closely linked. This means that a healthy gut, filled with so-called friendly bacteria, will likely improve skin health.
This is why, Dr Patel says, that kefir – which contains friendly bacteria – may help symptoms.
‘We are increasingly recognising the gut-skin axis,‘ he says.
‘Early studies on probiotics [friendly bacteria products] show modest improvements in some patients,‘ he says. ‘Fermented foods [such as kefir] aren‘t treatments, but they may support microbiome health.‘
Experts also add that while a cream like those by Skin: Genius will almost certainly help ease eczema symptoms, other emollients found in high street pharmacies are just as effective.
Today, Luke says he lives in what he describes as an ‘uneasy truce‘ with his eczema.
He still experiences flare-ups and carefully manages triggers, including diet, heat and friction on the skin.
Interestingly, he also says that managing stress levels seems to help keep flare-ups at bay.
‘I‘ve learned that stress doesn‘t just sit in your mind – it shows up on your skin,‘ he says. ‘Eczema isn‘t just a skin problem, it‘s a three-way fight between your mind, your body and your gut.‘
