Quality of life of psoriatic patients evaluated by a new psychometric assessment tool: PsoDisk.

BACKGROUND: Psoriasis is a chronic skin disorder which negatively impacts a patient's quality of life (QoL). A recently published assessment tool, PsoDisk, has been proposed to evaluate patient's QoL. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to test PsoDisk as a QoL assessment tool in psoriatic patients undergoing treatment with adalimumab. METHODS: A retrospective, monocentric study, including patients who completed at least 48 weeks of both adalimumab therapy and PsoDisk assessment. PASI was assessed by the physician whereas the PsoDisk test was self-performed by the patient. Both were evaluated at each control visit throughout the study-period in order to detect changes in disease severity and the impact of quality of life, respectively. RESULTS: In total, we evaluated 31 patients selected from our database. At baseline, all aspects of patients' psycho-emotional and social lives were impaired. PASI score reduction correlated with a PsoDisk score decrease (r = 0.97; p = 0.02), reflecting an overall improvement of patient's QoL. CONCLUSION: PsoDisk was found to be easy to administer and intuitive for interpreting clinical results.