Associations between mental health and disease severity in individuals with psoriasis

TL;DR

People with psoriasis had worse mental health during the pandemic, but this was not linked to the severity of their skin condition.

Contribution

The study reveals that mental health in psoriasis patients is poor during the pandemic but not correlated with disease severity.

Findings

Psoriasis patients reported worse mental health than the general population during the pandemic.

No significant association was found between psoriasis severity and mental health indicators.

Longer illness duration was linked to lower psoriasis severity but not better mental health.

Abstract

This study’s aim was to research psoriasis patients' mental state and its relation to disease severity. It is shown that while individuals affected by psoriasis seemed to have worse mental health than the norm sample during the COVID-19 pandemic, there was no significant association between mental health and psoriasis severity. Nevertheless, mental health support for affected individuals is highly recommended, especially for young individuals.

Psoriasis and mental health are closely intertwined; however, certain aspects remain underexplored. Thus, continued research on this topic is important to deepen our understanding.

To explore the mental health of individuals with psoriasis – specifically depressive symptoms, mental functioning, stress symptoms and coping strategies – and to find associations with physical manifestations of psoriasis.

A cross-sectional sample of 214 individuals with psoriasis (107 with illness duration >16 years and 107 with illness duration ≤16 years; cut-off: median) completed the Beck Depression Inventory-II, the SF-12 measuring mental and physical functioning, and the Stress and Coping Inventory. Additionally, the Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) was assessed. The study was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Individuals with psoriasis reported worse mental and physical health than the general population (norm sample of SF-12) but did not differ significantly from each other. While individuals with illness duration >16 years had lower psoriasis severity than those with illness duration ≤16 years, mean PASI scores indicated low illness severity overall. PASI scores did not show significant correlations with mental health inventories in either group.

Individuals with psoriasis reported lower mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic than a healthy, prepandemic norm sample, independent of psoriasis severity. Age and illness duration seem to facilitate coping with the disease. Nevertheless, individuals with psoriasis are in need of continued mental health support, regardless of illness duration.

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