BACKGROUND Psoriasis is a chronic inflammatory skin and joints disease. Due to the complicated nature of this disease process, the layperson may have difficulty retaining the information in a short consultation visit with the physician. OBJECTIVE To evaluate a specialized outpatient clinic population knowledge about their psoriatic disease and promote better approaches. METHODS Participants in our study were randomized to two groups: pamphlet and video. Both educational media contained the same overall information. A questionnaire on basic concepts was given before and after the educational intervention to assess baseline disease knowledge and knowledge acquisition, respectively RESULTS A total of 74 patients (mean age 50.5 years) were enrolled and the educational material was considered useful by 66% of the participants. As to the knowledge acquisition, a good understanding of the noninfectious nature of the disease (97%) was demonstrated but understanding about the basic pathophysiology of the disease was poor (39%), 78% showed knowledge about the early signs of arthritis. After one year, patients retained knowledge and achieved similar score on same questions CONCLUSIONS The findings in our investigation are in line with those found in the literature and show that knowledge retention can be enhanced by written and video patient education, which can lead to better patient compliance and treatment adherence. CLINICALTRIAL Número do Parecer: 2.014.058 Pesquisador: DIMITRI LUZ FELIPE DA SILVA Área Temática: Versão: 3 CAAE: 62767416.5.0000.5404 Instituição Proponente: Hospital de Clínicas da UNICAMP Patrocinador Principal: Financiamento Próprio