PATTERN OF SKIN DISEASES IN PATIENTS VISITING A TERTIARY CARE HEALTH FACILITY AT HYDERABAD, PAKISTAN

Authors

  • Khalida Naz Memon
  • Rafique Ahmed Soomro
  • Mohammad Shahid Ansari

Abstract

Background: The morbidity associated with skin diseases makes them an important public health
problem. Very scanty literature is found on the problem which is either disease-based, community
based or a specified population group-based. Objective of this study was to assess the pattern of
skin diseases in patients and to determine their relation with demographic characteristics.
Methods: This descriptive study was conducted at Dermatology Out-patient Department of
Liaquat University Hospital, Jamshoro, Pakistan for the period from 10th January to 10th February
2008. Four hundred and eleven patients were enrolled during the study period. The study
population comprised of newly diagnosed cases as well as relapsing cases presenting at the
facility. The criterion for registering the patients was clinical diagnosis although few cases were
supported by investigations, too. The data was collected through a pre-designed questionnaire and
analysed through SPSS-12. Result: Skin problems are fairly common among children and women.
In children of less than 10 years age, 82.5% visiting the facility suffer from infectious skin
diseases. Among the infectious diseases, scabies is highly prevalent disease (45.5%). The majority
of the patients belong to rural or slum areas (77.2%), low socio-economic strata (68.9%), and
living in overcrowded families (82%). A strong association between skin infections and water
inadequacy (p=0.016) was found, and scabies shows a strong statistical association with
overcrowding (p=0.025). Conclusion: The skin diseases involve every age strata of our
population but it is fairly common in younger age group, women, and people who do not practice
hygiene. Out-reach services for the rural and slum communities and health education will give
good results on prevention of skin diseases.
Keywords: Skin diseases, demographic characteristics, environmental factors.

References

Thappa DM. History of dermatology, venereology and

leprology in India. J Postgrad Med 2002;48(2):160-5.

Kathem K, Rubiay A. Dermato-epidemiology: A Household

survey among two urban areas in Basrah City, Iraq. Int J

Dermatol 2005;44:641-5.

Rao GS, Kumar SS, Sandhya. Pattern of skin diseases in an

Indian village. Indian J Med Sci 2003;57(3):108-10.

Dogra S, Kumar B. Epidemiology of Skin Diseases in School

Children: A Study from Northern India. Pediatr Dermatol

;20(6):470-3.

Karthikeyan K, Thappa DM, Jeevankumar B. Pattern of

Pediatric Dermatoses in a Referral Center in South India.

Indian Pediatr 2004;41:373-7.

Maria K, Sridhar KS, Pramond K, Rao G. Pattern of skin

diseases in Bantwal Taluq, Dakshina Kannada. Indian J

Dermatol Venereol Leprol 2000;66(5):247-8.

Hay R, Bendeck SE, Chen S. Skin Diseases. In: Jamison DT,

Breman JG, Measham AR, editors. Disease Control Priorities

in Developing Countries. 2nd edition. Washington (DC):

World Bank; 2006. Chapter 37. Available from:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK11733/

Nuzhat Y, Khan MR. Spectrum of common childhood skin

diseases: A single centre experience. J Pak Med Assoc

;55(2):60-3.

Abbas Z, Hosein M. Prevalence of skin diseases in Hamedan,

Iran in 2002. Indian J Dermatol 2005;50(4):208-11.

Downloads

Published

2011-12-01

How to Cite

Memon, K. N., Soomro, R. A., & Ansari, M. S. (2011). PATTERN OF SKIN DISEASES IN PATIENTS VISITING A TERTIARY CARE HEALTH FACILITY AT HYDERABAD, PAKISTAN. Journal of Ayub Medical College Abbottabad, 23(4), 37–39. Retrieved from https://jamc.ayubmed.edu.pk/index.php/jamc/article/view/2331

Issue

Vol. 23 No. 4 (2011): JOURNAL OF AYUB MEDICAL COLLEGE, ABBOTTABAD

Section

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

License

Journal of Ayub Medical College, Abbottabad is an OPEN ACCESS JOURNAL which means that all content is FREELY available without charge to all users whether registered with the journal or not. The work published by J Ayub Med Coll Abbottabad is licensed and distributed under the creative commons License  CC BY ND Attribution-NoDerivs. Material printed in this journal is OPEN to access, and are FREE for use in academic and research work with proper citation. J Ayub Med Coll Abbottabad accepts only original material for publication with the understanding that except for abstracts, no part of the data has been published or will be submitted for publication elsewhere before appearing in J Ayub Med Coll Abbottabad. The Editorial Board of J Ayub Med Coll Abbottabad makes every effort to ensure the accuracy and authenticity of material printed in J Ayub Med Coll Abbottabad. However, conclusions and statements expressed are views of the authors and do not reflect the opinion/policy of J Ayub Med Coll Abbottabad or the Editorial Board.

USERS are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This is in accordance with the BOAI definition of open access.

AUTHORS retain the rights of free downloading/unlimited e-print of full text and sharing/disseminating the article without any restriction, by any means including twitter, scholarly collaboration networks such as ResearchGate, Academia.eu, and social media sites such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Scholar and any other professional or academic networking site.