A clinical study of childhood and adolescent psoriasis

Background: Few clinical studies are available on childhood and adolescent psoriasis in Korea. Objective: The purpose of this study was to analyze clinical features of childhood and adolescent psoriasis in a referral center in Korea. Methods: We performed retrospective medical record-based analyses for 255 psoriasis patients younger than 16 years of age at the time of diagnosis at our center from March 2001 to July 2010. Age, sex, onset age, familial history, site of involvement, type of psoriasis, nail involvement, initial PASI score, and treatment modality were analyzed. Results: There was no sexual predominance; mean age of onset was 8.85 years; 17.25% of patients had a familial history. Upper extremities, lower extremities, trunk, scalp and face were the most commonly involved sites in sequence. Guttate psoriasis (58.90%) was the most common type of psoriasis. Nail involvement was observed in 11.11% of patients. The mean initial PASI score at the time of diagnosis was 7.9. The most common treatment was topical steroids and topical vitamin D in combination. Conclusion: Childhood and adolescent psoriasis is not an uncommon disease. A larger scale epidemiological study is needed.