Treatment satisfaction of patients with psoriasis with topical therapy in a real-world setting: unmet need for higher effectiveness

Abstract

Background

Topical medication is the mainstay for treatment of mild psoriasis. However, dissatisfaction with topicals is common and rates of non-adherence are high. Assessing patients’ perspectives can help to identify unmet needs.

Objective

Our aim was to investigate satisfaction of patients with psoriasis with topical therapy and to determine influencing factors.

Methods

Patients were recruited from the Department of Dermatology, University Medical Center Mannheim, Germany. Satisfaction was assessed using the Treatment Satisfaction Questionnaire for Medication version 1.4 with the domains effectiveness, side effects, convenience, and global satisfaction (scale 0–100 each). The impact of sociodemographic and disease characteristics was determined by multivariate regression.

Results

Averaged across the cohort (n = 122, mean age 52.5 years, 58.2% male), the side effects domain had the highest mean satisfaction score (89.7), followed by convenience (72.5), global satisfaction (60.8), and effectiveness (55.0). Comparing specific medications, combinations of corticosteroids and vitamin D analogues were rated best in effectiveness. Treatment satisfaction was influenced by age, partnership, ability to apply topicals independently, disease-related quality-of-life impairment, sole or adjunctive use of topicals and pruritus.

Conclusions

Participants were particularly satisfied with safety but rather dissatisfied with effectiveness of topicals. Topical therapy should be adapted to individual needs with special attention to effectiveness.

Keywords:

• Satisfaction
• psoriasis
• topical therapy
• TSQM

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank all participants.

Disclosure statement

N. Ninosu, S. Hoelker, M. Kappenstein, and S. Buettner declare no conflicts of interest. W. K. Peitsch served as advisor for and/or obtained speakers’ honoraria from and/or received grants from and/or participated in clinical trials by the following companies: AbbVie, ALK-Abello, Almirall Hermal, Array Biopharma, Beiersdorf, Biotest, BMS, Boehringer Ingelheim, Celgene, Dermapharm, Dermasence, Eli Lilly, Galderma, GSK, Janssen-Cilag, L’Oreal, La Roche Posay, LEO Pharma, Medac, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Dr. Pfleger, Pierre Fabre, P&M Cosmetics, Roche, Sanofi, Sun Pharma, and UCB Pharma. M.-L. Schaarschmidt has been an advisor to and/or received speakers’ honoraria from and/or received grants from and/or participated in clinical trials by the following companies: Abbvie, Allmirall, Biogen Inc., BMS GmbH, Böhringer-Ingelheim, Celgene, Eli Lilly, Janssen-Cilag GmbH, Merck Serono GmbH, MSD SHARP & DOHME GmbH, Novartis Pharma GmbH, and UCB. The disclosed conflicts of interest have not influenced the content of this manuscript.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article. For the publication fee we acknowledge financial support by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft within the funding programme „Open Access Publikationskosten“ as well as by Heidelberg University.