Farah Modlej Alloboon¹, Tarik Elsaid¹, Leena Mohammed Alzakry², Arwa Mohammed Alrefai³ and Mostafa Kofi¹*

¹Prince Sultan Military Medical City, Saudi Arabia
²Ministry of Health, Saudi Arabia
³King Fahd Armed Forces Hospital, Saudi Arabia

*Corresponding Author: Mostafa Kofi, Prince Sultan Military Medical City, Saudi Arabia.

Received: December 19, 2023; Published: January 23, 2024

Abstract

Acne vulgaris is one of the most prevalent chronic skin disease, a mainly adolescent and young adults. Acne vulgaris is a multi-factorial disease, apart from basic factor of hormonal changes and bacterial outbreaks, there are several other factors that may impact acne prevalence including emotional stress, which has long been thought to aggravate acne vulgaris, although previous reports have mainly been anecdotal in nature. In this research we aim to assess the severity of acne vulgaris in relation to stress.

Objectives: To identify the prevalence of stress among acne vulgaris patients in PHC in Riyadh. To identify the demographic characteristics of acne vulgaris patients. To determine the association between psychological stress and acne vulgaris.

Methodology: A cross sectional study. 119 Acne vulgaris patients in Prince Sultan Military Medical City (PSMMC). Aged 12-45 years old, male and female, married and unmarried. With educational level including primary, intermediate, secondary, university, master, and PH.D. and socioeconomic status including low, middle, and high. Patients with other dermatological disorders, chronic medical illness, past history of psychiatric disorders, pregnancy, lactation, mental retardation, and patients who were on other drugs which can aggravate acne was excluded from the study. Participants receiving sedatives, antidepressants, or exogenous glucocorticoids was excluded. Participants was assessed and diagnosed with acne vulgaris by dermatologist. Data was collected by using self-administered questionnaire. Covering sociodemographic characteristics and stress level using perceived stress scale (PSS). Data was interpreted using excel, and was analyzed using SPSS.

Results: Ales representing 72.3% of the total population. The largest group of less than 25 years old who represented 47.1% of the total population. Most of the participants were Saudi Arabian in nationality and the vast majority of the population are not married (74.8%). there was a strong association between stress and the acne grade as the more the stress increases the higher the grade of the acne.

Conclusion: Stress is associated with the severity of acne, as stress worsens and increases acne by numerous mechanisms, therefore, relaxation activities such as meditation, yoga, deep breathing exercises, and physical exercises could be used with the pharmacological treatment to treat the acne. To enhance the level of evidence and set up more robust evidence, we recommend conducting studies on larger cohorts with an equal number of males and females.

 Keywords: Stress; Yoga, Deep Breathing

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Citation

Citation: Mostafa Kofi., et al. “Psychological Stress among Acne Vulgaris Patients in PHCs, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia”.Acta Scientific Medical Sciences 8.2 (2024): 33-43.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2024 Mostafa Kofi., et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.