Psoriasis linked to major comorbidities

Patients with psoriasis have increasingly higher chances of having at least one other major comorbidity when compared to patients who do not have psoriasis, study results indicate.

Investigators with Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, conducted a survey of physicians treating 9,035 patients with psoriasis. Fifty-two percent of patients had mild disease, 36 percent had moderate and 12 percent had severe disease impacting more than 10 percent of their body surface area, according to a news release.

Psoriasis overall was associated with a higher prevalence of chronic pulmonary disease (adjusted odds ratio, 1.08; 95 percent confidence interval, 1.02-1.15), diabetes mellitus (1.22; 1.11-1.35), diabetes with systemic complications (1.34; 1.11-1.62), mild liver disease (1.41; 1.12-1.76), peptic ulcers (1.27; 1.03-1.58) myocardial infarction (1.34; 1.07-1.69), renal disease (1.28; 1.11-1.48) and rheumatologic disease (2.04; 1.71-2.42), according to the study.

Study authors determined that additional diabetes-associated systemic complications, such as neuropathy and retinopathy, were correlated with severity of psoriasis. These diseases share a common pathway, TH-1 cytokines, which promote inflammation and insulin resistance.

“The complications from diabetes and links to COPD, kidney disease and peptic ulcers we identified suggest new areas for research, while for the first time, demonstrating how increasing body surface area affected by psoriasis is directly associated with increasing risk of atherosclerotic disease,” Joel M. Gelfand, M.D., associate professor of dermatology and epidemiology, and senior study author, said in the news release.

The study was published online Aug. 7 in JAMA Dermatology.

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