Severe psoriasis predominantly affects men, according to a new study in the American Journal of Clinical Dermatology.

In the study of 5,438 Swedish psoriasis patients, women had significantly (p<0.001) lower median Psoriasis Area Severity Index (PASI) values than men (5.4 for women versus 7.3 for men), and this held across all ages and in all areas of the body except for the head. The study found no differences between women and men in the use of medications before enrolment in the register that would have explained the observed sex difference.

"Our results tell us that the well-established gender differences in the utilization of psoriasis care can at least partially be explained by a higher prevalence of more severe disease in men," says study author Marcus Schmitt-Egenolf, who is researcher at the Department of Public Health and Clinical Medicine at Umeå University in Sweden. "These findings should motivate a gender perspective in the management of severe psoriasis and its comorbidities, such as cardiovascular and metabolic disease.”