This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.
Infections contribute to risk of psoriasis, antibiotics do not
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
Infections contribute to the risk of psoriasis, while antibiotic use does not, according to data presented in JAMA Dermatology.
“We found that antibiotics were no more strongly associated with newly diagnosed psoriasis in children than infections managed without antibiotics,” Daniel B. Horton, MD, at Rutgers University, and colleagues wrote. “Overall, our findings support prior literature that infections may play a role in the development of psoriasis but suggest that antibiotics do not substantially, independently contribute to that risk.”
Daniel B. Horton
In a case control study, Horton and colleagues used electronic health records from June 27, 1994 to Jan. 15, 2013 of patients aged 1 to 15. The researchers compared 845 children recently diagnosed with psoriasis to 8,450 children randomly chosen at the time of psoriasis diagnosis. The children randomly chosen at time of diagnosis were excluded if they had any immunodeficiency, inflammatory bowel disease or juvenile arthritis.
“Psoriasis is a chronic autoimmune disease that affects approximately 4 in 1000 children,” Horton and colleagues wrote. “The pathogenesis of psoriasis is incompletely understood but likely involves genetic, immunologic, and environmental factors. More recent studies have found an association between childhood antibiotic use and 2 related pediatric autoimmune disease: inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA). Antibiotics disrupt human microbiota, and human microbial disturbance has been implicated in the pathogenesis of pediatric IBD and JIA.”
After adjusting for country, matching, outpatient visits, socioeconomic status and infections within the past 2 years, the researchers found that antibiotic exposure in the last 2 years was weakly associated with incident psoriasis (aOR = 1.2; 95% CI, 1.0-1.5). They found that antibiotic treated nonskin infections were not associated with psoriasis (aOR = 1.1; 95% CI, 0.9-1.4), while untreated nonskin infections were associated with psoriasis (aOR = 1.5; 95% CI, 1.3-1.8). In addition, they found that both treated and untreated skin infections were associated with psoriasis (respective aOR = 1.5; 95% CI, 1.2-1.7 and aOR = 1.3; 95% CI, 1.1-1.6).
“We showed there was no apparent association between antibiotics and psoriasis in children,” Horton told Infectious Diseases in Children. “This in no way alters the message from many other studies that antibiotics are overprescribed to children and that antibiotic use and overuse are associated with any number of unfavorable outcomes.”
Disclosures: Horton reports no relevant financial disclosures. Scott reports receiving research funding from Takeda. Please see the study for all other authors’ relevant financial disclosures.
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts