Chronic Urticaria: From diagnosis to treatment in a Tunisian population

Aim. - Urticaria is an inflammatory skin disease and is a common reason of consultation in dermatology. Chronic Urticaria (CU) is defined by recurrent episodes repeated iteratively for at least 6 weeks. Chronic Urticaria is classified according to whether it is inducible or not into chronic spontaneous Urticaria or chronic inducible Urticaria. The aim of this study is to determinate epidemiological, clinical and etiological characteristics of chronic Urticaria in the Tunisian population in order to ameliorate the treatment. Patients and methods. - The study was performed as a case-series study of 200 newly referred patients to our dermatology unit in Fattouma Bourguiba university hospital over a period of 7 years (2010-2016). Results. - The total number of patients was: 132 females and 68 males. The average age of the total population was 36.3 years. All patients had typical skin rash and clinical signs of Urticaria. In our study, CU was spontaneous in 64% of patients and inducible in 26% of patients. Stress was reported as a trigger for chronic spontaneous urticaria (CSU) by several patients (12%). The most common trigger for chronic inducible urticaria (IU) was heat followed by pressure. All patients had been treated by antihistamine drugs with a favorable outcome in 45% of patients. Strengthening of treatment was recommended in patients who escaped first-line treatment. A fortunate discovery of dysthyroidism was made in 5% of patients. Conclusion. - We suggest further investigate the role of dysthyroidism clinical and biological signs in chronic Urticaria. (C) 2021 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.