Analysis of the Patients' Behavior and Understanding of the Skin Diseases

Kim, Koung Moon; Kye, Young Chul; Kim, Soo Nam

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Many patients who visit dermatological clinics have some kind of misunderstanding about their skin diseases and treatments. So, we need more knowledge clinically and epidermiologically about our patients'behavior and understanding of their skin diseases, and, in doing so, we would be able to treat the patients more correctly and properly.
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this clinical analysis was to fine out about patients'behavior and understanding of their skin diseases. METHOD: Questionnaires from 1143 patients aged mainly over 20 were analysed. The questionnaire aimed to find out whether they had ever received treatment for their skin diseases, whether they used non-medical treatment, how they felt about the effect of non-medical treatments, where they first visited for their skin diseases, attitudes towards their own health status and their allergic history. RESULT: The results are summarized as follows. 1. Of 1143 patients, there were 540 males and 603 females. The male to female ratio was 1:1.1. 2. 44% of patients thought that foods may affect their skin problems and the commonest cause they blamed was flesh and meat(57.3%). 3. 36.6% of patients thought that they had an allergic diathesis. 4. 56.2% of patients visited the dermatologic clinics initially and 17% visited the drug store initially. 18.1% of patients visited the general hospital initially and 8.2% and 0.6% of patients seeked the advice of primary physicians and other medical specialists respectively. 5. 25% of patients used alternative medicines such as folk medicine or herb medication for their skin diseases and in 6. 36.1% of patients who used the alternative medicines thought themselves to have an allergic diathesis and this was significantly higher than that(18.3%) of non-users of alternative medicine(p<0.05).
CONCLUSION
We found that 73.3% of patients initially visited the dermatology clinic but many patients also folk medicine and herb therapy (25% of all patients) because of chronicity and the recurrent nature of skin diseases. In view of the above facts, one should inform our patients exactly about the skin diseases and follow do better medical practices.