Assessment of quality of life among children with atopic dermatitis

ABSTRACT

Patients with skin diseases experience a wide range of symptoms, which affect their lives, ranging from trivial problems to major handicaps. Sometimes, these symptoms are caused by objective changes that impair daily life directly and measurably, while at other times the impairment is subtle and occurs mainly on psychological level. The aim of this work is to study the impact of atopic dermatitis on the quality of life [QOL] among affected children. The aim of this work is to study the impact of atopic dermatitis [AD] on the quality of life [QOL] among affected children. One hundred child aged 7-13 years were the cases of the study. They were selected from the patients attending the dermatology outpatient clinic at El-Hussin University Hospital. Also, one hundred child were selected as a control with age and sex matching. Quality of life was assessed for patients and controls through a specific questionnaire. The QOL was good among 24% of cases in comparison to 88% of controls. It was observed that 91.3% with severe AD had poor QOL, while, 37.5% with mild severity had good QOL with statistical significance difference. The QOL of patients with atopic dermatitis is clearly impaired with comparison to control group. QOL showed strong negative effect with increase the severity of the disease