Severity evaluation indexes

Abstract

Severity Evaluation Indexes are very useful instruments for the assessment of a patient with nail psoriasis. Their role is essential in clinical trials, baseline consultation, therapeutic strategy, and consequent follow-up. Therefore, they should be objective, reproducible, and simple to perform. Various parameters are taken into account such as localization of the inflammatory process, polymorphism of clinical findings, disease extent, and quality of life impairment. In order to assess disease severity, studies have either focused on one specific clinical sign or have tried to combine multiple features to improve their validity. Qualitative assessment is quicker but, on the other hand, grades subjectively the severity of each feature. Numeric or quantitative evaluation is more objective but is more time-consuming.