Do patients with psoriasis have an increased risk of cardiovascular disease?

In a recent study, researchers who used PET and CT for testing found that patients who have psoriasis have an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. 

Researchers published their findings in the British Journal of Dermatology, with the main objective to find out if there was a relationship between global vascular inflammation and subcutaneous adipose tissue inflammation in patients with psoriasis.

The study was conducted in a university hospital dermatology clinic in Finland testing 12 patients with moderate-to-severe psoriasis and matched controls without psoriasis, age and sex were matched for all. Each underwent FDG-PET/CT for researchers to measure inflammation.

“Global arterial inflammation and subcutaneous inflammation were significantly increased in patients with moderate-to-severe psoriasis compared with controls,” wrote the researchers.

The study was limited due to the small sample size. Larger samples may be tested in order to increase validity of the findings.