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I know very little about this in dogs - but my dog has arthiritis, hip
dysplasia and cervical disc disease.  She's 9.5 yrs old so most of
this is merely her getting old. The CDD is rare in her breed however.

I mention this because the first thing we did when she was obviously
in excruciating pain, was try the steroid shot.  It did nothing that I
can tell for her.  And we had to wait about 3 weeks before we could do
something else to ease her pain.  Still, many dogs respond well to
steroids.  Bay was miserable on it.  still in great pain and unable to
control her bladder - something she has never had a problem with. If a
dog could feel humiliated, she was there.  it upset her so much.  She
was never housetrained - she trained herself.  She won't go anywhere
but on grass.  (preferably short grass <g>)  

anwyay.  my thoughts are with you. Discoid is a bit difficult to treat
in humans so I can imagine in dogs it's even more challenging.
Topical creams and all that being only somewhat helpful.  I wish I
knew more - i guess that one question to ask is - are any of the meds
used to treat human autoimmune disease available to her?  Examples
would be Plaquenil, Methotrexate, Imuran...  but I don't believe that
most of these have a great impact on Discoid.  Of course, sun exposure
is a big issue.  Don't know how much she goes out in the sun but if
she does and would otherwise be miserable if she couldn't, than look
into a sunblock that would be effective for her pup nose.