Measures used in specifying psoriasis lesion(s), global disease and quality of life: A systematic review

Objective: To assess which measures are utilized to quantify lesions, disease severity, and quality of life in the current literature on psoriasis vulgaris. Methods: A MEDLINE search was performed with the keyword 'psoriasis' and the following limits 'All Adult: 19+ years', 'published in the last 5 years', 'English', 'Randomized Controlled Trial', and 'Humans'. The 'Methods' section of the individual articles were reviewed for inclusion criteria that described the study participants' state of psoriasis or disease generalization at baseline, methods used to classify or measure psoriasis during the study, the primary and secondary endpoints, and the quality of life measures utilized in each study. Results: A search resulted in a total of 180 articles, out of which 134 were utilized for the review. The criteria most commonly utilized were 'moderate to severe psoriasis', 'BSA >= 10%', 'mild to moderate psoriasis', and 'severe psoriasis'. PASI was the most commonly used measure to describe the extent of psoriasis. The most common QoL measure used was DLQI, being used in 54.8% of the articles that used some form of QoL measure/s. Discussion: Various measures are being utilized for the same purpose of generalizing disease/lesion severity and determining 'quality of life'.