Clinical Spectrum of Pregnancy Related Dermatoses in a Tertiary Care Hospital in Western India

Abstract

Introduction: Pregnancy is characterized by altered endocrine, metabolic, and immunologic milieus resulting in multiple cutaneous changes, both physiologic and pathologic. This research was undertaken to study physiological changes of pregnancy and prevalence of various pregnancy specific and non-specific dermatoses.
 Methodology: A retrospective study was conducted at the dermatology out-patient department of a tertiary care center in western India and data of 308 pregnant patients presenting with dermatoses, in the age-group of 19-35 years was analyzed. Detailed history, clinical examination and necessary investigations were reviewed.
 Results: Among 308 patients, 302(98.05%) presented with physiological skin changes of pregnancy, 118(38.31%) had pregnancy specific and 185(60.06%) had pregnancy non-specific dermatoses. The most common physiological change was pigmentary changes (n=294). Atopic eruption of pregnancy (n=79) was the most common pregnancy specific dermatoses followed by polymorphic eruption of pregnancy (n=38). In non-specific dermatoses, infectious diseases were more common (fungal, n=128; viral, n=25).
 Conclusion: Pregnancy non-specific dermatoses were seen more commonly than pregnancy specific dermatoses. Lower socioeconomic strata and overcrowding may be the reasons behind large number of infectious dermatoses that we saw in our study.

Women’s Health: Most Common Physiologic and Pathologic Cutaneous Manifestations During Pregnancy

“…Dermatoses specific to pregnancy are skin pathologies that commonly occur in pregnancy or exacerbations of pre-existed dermatologic diseases seen in gravid women. The most common pregnancy-specific dermatosis was the atopic eruption of pregnancy which was seen in 4% to 72.72% of women with pregnancy-associated dermatosis [9,13] and it was also reported in other four studies as well but with lower frequency [9,11,13,18]. Prurigo of pregnancy can be considered in the second rank as it has been reported in up to 47% [8,14], and there were two studies that reported the presence of this condition [8,14].…”

“…This systematic review included 11 articles that met the eligibility criteria and were published between 2015 and 2021 (Table 1) [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18]. In regard to the study designs of included articles, there were two cross-sectional studies [14,18], three cross-sectional were observational studies [10,16,17], one observational [8], one prospective observational cohort [9], one retrospective [11], and one prospective [13] whereas one study did not specify the design [12]. The total number of participants in the 11 studies was 14,813 participants, the least number of subjects included in a study was 100 pregnant women [12], and the largest number included was 9,679 [8].…”

“…The total number of participants in the 11 studies was 14,813 participants, the least number of subjects included in a study was 100 pregnant women [12], and the largest number included was 9,679 [8]. The included studies were conducted in only four countries; one study in Nigeria [9], one study in Libya [13], one study in Brazil [18], whereas the remaining eight studies were all in India [8,[10][11][12][15][16][17]. The overall major dermatological conditions during pregnancy were physiological skin changes [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18] and pregnancy-specific dermatopathologies [8,9].…”

“…The included studies were conducted in only four countries; one study in Nigeria [9], one study in Libya [13], one study in Brazil [18], whereas the remaining eight studies were all in India [8,[10][11][12][15][16][17]. The overall major dermatological conditions during pregnancy were physiological skin changes [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18] and pregnancy-specific dermatopathologies [8,9]. However, only one study reported that STDs and other infectious skin disorders were the major presenting dermatosis during pregnancy [10].…”

“…Physiological skin changes are the predominantly recognized dermatologic manifestations of pregnancy as eight studies reported [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18], three of which discovered that all included pregnant women had physiological skin changes [12,14,15]. On the other hand, these physiological changes varied in prevalence in two different studies, which showed a range of 17% [13] to 99% [17].…”