Epidemiology, Comorbidity and Risk Factors for Psoriatic Arthritis: a Health Insurance Claims Database Analysis

Psoriatic arthritis is a frequent manifestation of pso­riasis, and has a high level of impact on physical func­tioning, work ability and quality of life. However, there have been few studies of the epidemiology, de­velopment of and risk factors for concomitant psoriatic arthritis in patients with psoriasis. This study analysed data from a German public health insurance database of > 2 million individuals. Factors influencing the de­velopment of psoriatic arthritis were determined by descriptively analysing comorbidities and Cox regres­sion modelling. The prevalences of psoriasis and pso­riatic arthritis were 2.63% and 0.29% in adults (18+ years) and, respectively, 0.30% and 0.01% in child­ren (0–17 years). The proportion of adult patients with incident psoriasis who developed concomitant psoriatic arthritis within five years after diagnosis of psoriasis (mean 2.3 years) was 2.6%. Cardiovascular diseases are the most frequent comorbidity in patients with psoriasis with or without concomitant psoriatic arthritis. Depression and neurosis/stress disorder were identified as indicators for the development of psoriatic arthritis.