Quality of life in patients with autoimmune bullous disorders

Abstract

Autoimmune vesicular diseases have a significant effect on the quality of life of these patients and treatment with corticosteroids and immunosuppressive drugs can also affect the quality of life of these patients. Therefore, attention to quality of life and mental status is as important as clinical status in these patients and in this study, the quality of life of patients with autoimmune vesicular diseases was evaluated. Methods and Materials: This cross-sectional study was performed on individuals over 16 years of age with autoimmune vesicular disease referred to the dermatology and hair clinic of Sina Hospital in Tabriz from April 1999 onwards for 6 months by a dermatologist based on clinical manifestations. Laboratory findings, histopathology and immunofluorescence findings have been definitively diagnosed. 3 questionnaires including 1- Demographic information and autoimmune blistering disease 2- Quality of life based on ABQOL questionnaire and 3- Disease severity based on ABSIS questionnaire. Completed by the patient. Then the data were statistically analyzed by descriptive and analytical analysis with SPSS software. Results: In this study, 100 patients were studied. The age of patients was 52 2 2 years. In the studied patients, 44 (44%) were male and 56 (56%) were female. 76 patients (76%) had Pemphigus vulgaris, 6 patients (6%) had Pemphigus foliaceous, and 18 patients (18%) had Bullous pemphigoid. The quality of life questionnaire of Bolus autoimmune disease (ABQOL) was filled out by patients. The median response of the calculated patients was 6 and the minimum score was 0 and the maximum score was 27. Disease severity was also scored on the ABSIS scale. The mean score of patients was calculated as 1 and the minimum score was 0 and the maximum score was 81.75. The relationship between quality of life with ABQOL scale and disease severity based on ABSIS showed that quality of life with ABQOL scale with disease severity based on ABSIS has a significant direct relationship (P value = 0.001, Correlation Coefficient = 0.380). Quality of life with ABQOL scale had no significant relationship with disease type (P value = 0.095) and gender (P value = 0.153). Quality of life with ABQOL scale had a significant but weak inverse relationship with patients' age (value P = 0.049, Correlation Coefficient =0.139).