Clinical and Demographic Profile of Patients With Psoriasis and Its Effect on the Quality of Life Using Dermatology Quality of Life Index: A Cross Sectional Study

Abstract

THIS ARTICLE MAY BE CITED AS: Rauf S, Akhtar S, Ali F. Clinical and demographic profile of patients with psoriasis and its effect on the quality of life using dermatology quality of life index: a cross sectional study. Khyber Med Univ J 2019;11(4):236-9. ABSTRACT OBJECTIVE:To determine clinical and demographic patterns among patients with psoriasis and their effects on quality of life (QoL) using Dermatology Quality of Life Index (DLQI). Consecutive sampling technique was used to select 168 patients with psoriasis. DLQI used on all patients, was split in to two groups and score >10 was taken as very large effect on patient's life. Data was analyzed through SPSS v.20 software. RESULTS:Out of total 168 patients, 115 (68.5%) were female. Plaque was the commonest (n=106; 63.1%) type of psoriasis followed by guttate (n=24; 14.3%) and palmoplantar (n=24; 14.3%). Majority of psoriasis were young adults (n=60; 35.7%), followed by adults (n=56; 33.3%). Mean DLQI score was 10.98±4.300. Group-1 (DLQI score=0-10) included 86 (51.2%) patients and Group-2 (DLQI score >10) included 82 (48.8%) patients. A significant mean difference was recorded among the two groups of DLQI and age of the patient on Independent sample t-test {t (167) =-15.432, p = 0.000}. In group-1, 59 (51.3%) were female and 27 (50.9%) were males; while in group-2, 56 (48.7%) were females and 26 (49.1%) were males. CONCLUSION:Psoriasis is almost twice more common in female and plaque psoriasis is the commonest variety. Psoriasis has a very large effect on QoL in almost half of the patients. Impact of psoriasis on QoL of the patient is the same in both genders and is more for the erythrodermic form of psoriasis.