Cardiovascular risk factors in high-need psoriasis patients and its implications for biological therapies.

BACKGROUND

The associations between psoriasis and cardiovascular risk factors are reported to be stronger as psoriasis severity increases. This makes studying cardiovascular risk factors in high-need psoriasis patients, eligible for biological therapy, interesting.

OBJECTIVE

To survey the prevalence of cardiovascular risk factors in high-need psoriasis patients and to compare these data to patients with other dermatological diseases. Furthermore, the implications of these findings for treatment with biologics were outlined.

METHODS

The prevalence of cardiovascular risk factors was investigated in a high-need psoriatic patient cohort and compared to patients with other skin diseases who filled out a questionnaire about the presence of cardiovascular risk factors.

RESULTS

A significantly higher prevalence of obesity, smoking, and hypertension was found for the high-need psoriatic patients' cohort compared with non-psoriatic controls. Striking differences were found with respect to body mass index and obesity, as 35.5% of all high-need psoriatic patients were obese.

CONCLUSIONS

High-need psoriatic patients show a high prevalence of cardiovascular risk factors, and may consequently be predisposed to cardiovascular diseases. As this is relevant for therapy management in daily clinical practice, especially biologics, cardiovascular risk should be evaluated for each high-need psoriasis patient before and during systemic treatment.