Pruritic folliculitis and serum androgen levels

Abstract

Pruritic folliculitis (PF) is one of the specific dermatoses of pregnancy the aetiology of which remains unknown. Several theories have been proposed, and the most commonly accepted is that it represents a hormonally induced acne, as seen in patients taking progestogenic steroids. This theory led to the proposition that serum androgen levels may be elevated in this condition, and may be causative. We studied a cohort of 125 pregnant women presenting with a variety of pregnancy dermatoses of whom 12 had PF. These women were compared with 138 pregnant control subjects without a pregnancy dermatosis to determine whether serum androgens were elevated. There was no significant elevation of serum androgens in the 12 cases of PF. There was an overall preponderance of male infants among the PF cases and birthweight of the infants was found to be reduced compared with those of controls. However, the outcome of pregnancy in all cases was favourable implying that PF has no adverse effect on foetal wellbeing.

The specific dermatoses of pregnancy: a re‐appraisal

“…recently reported a case of PF in which serum androgens were elevated 69 . However, a recent report of 12 cases of PF showed no significant increase in serum androgens (testosterone, dehydroepiandrosterone sulphate, androstenedione and sex hormone binding globulin) when compared with normal pregnant controls 70 . A recent report also showed an outcome with a male/female ratio of 2 : 1; 64 the significance of this remains unclear.…”

Pruritic folliculitis of pregnancy treated with narrowband (TL-01) ultraviolet B phototherapy

“…described a patient who had raised levels of testosterone and androstenedione, but were unable to determine if this was pathological or secondary to pregnancy. More recently, however, measurement of serum androgen levels in a series of patients with pruritic folliculitis of pregnancy compared with controls found no increase 7 …”