Patients with vitiligo, alopecia areata at increased risk for atopic dermatitis

Girish C. Mohan, MD, and Jonathan I. Silverberg, MD, PhD, MPH, conducted a literature search of Medline, Embase, Cochrane Library, Google Scholar and 12 additional journals from 1946 to April 5, 2014, to compare the prevalence of atopic dermatitis (AD) among patients with either vitiligo or alopecia areata (AA) and those without either disorder

There were 16 studies of vitiligo and 17 studies of AA included in the final review. Through a pooled analysis that included control patients without vitiligo and control patients without AA, patients with vitiligo or AA were found to have a significantly higher odds of AD than control patients, according to the researchers.

There were higher odds of AD in patients younger than 12 years with early-onset vitiligo compared with patients with late-onset vitiligo, according to pooled analysis of three studies. Patients with alopecia totalis or alopecia universalis had higher odds of AD when compared with patients with patchy alopecia, according to pooled analysis of four studies.