Prevalence of Oral Mucosal Lesions and Their Association with Severity of Psoriasis among Psoriatic Patients Referred To Dermatology Clinic: A Cross-Sectional Study in Kashan/Iran.

BACKGROUND: Psoriasis is a common inflammatory papulosquamous disease of the skin with unknown aetiology that may be associated with the abnormal T-cell function.

AIM: This study was aimed to determine the prevalence of oral mucosal lesions and their associations with severity of psoriasis in psoriatic patients attending the dermatologic clinic of Shahid Beheshti Teaching Hospital at Kashan, Iran.

METHODS: In this cross-sectional descriptive analytic study, all consecutive patients with psoriasis who referred to the dermatologic clinic at the Shahid Beheshti Hospital of Kashan University of Medical Sciences in Kashan City/ Iran were enrolled. All patients were examined for the presence of oral lesions, and the clinical and epidemiological features of the disease were recorded in a questionnaire for each patient. A biopsy was taken from atypical suspected patients with oral lesions by an expert dermatologist. Data were analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Science (Version 18). Descriptive statistics tests; Cross tabulation and Chi-square with Fisher's exact test were used.

RESULTS: Of total 177 psoriatic patients, 62 cases (35%) of patients were male, and 115 cases (65%) were female. Mean age of patients was 31.71 years. The oral lesion was seen in 83 cases (46.9%). Fissure tongue (28.2%) and geographic tongue (4.5%) were the most common oral lesions. The prevalence of oral lesions in patients with psoriasis significantly was associated with age, history of oral lesions, and with the onset of the oral lesions (P < 0.05). The most common form of psoriasis was chronic plaque form (Psoriasis Vulgaris) observed in 147 cases (83.1). The majority of patients (67.2%) were suffering from a mild form of the disease. Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) score of most patients was mild.

CONCLUSIONS: The prevalence of oral lesions such as Fissure tongue and geographic tongue is higher in psoriatic patients suggests further studies for approving the clinical importance of these apparently nonspecific lesions as possible predictors or markers of the severity of the cases suspected to Psoriasis disease.