EFFECT OF DATA NORMALIZATION FOR AGE ON THE CORRELATIONS BETWEEN CORNEOMETRIC VALUES AND SERUM MOLECULE LEVELS IN PLAQUE-TYPE PSORIATIC PATIENTS

Corneometry has been considered useful both to evaluate disease severi ty and to monitor psoriatic patients during treatment, However, a limi tation of this technique is that the patient's age influences the corn eometric determinations, thus reducing their clinical usefulness, The aim of this study was, therefore, to establish whether age normalizati on of the corneometric results may provide more reliable data for clin ical use, Corneometric levels were determined in 10 plaque-type psoria tic patients, under standard conditions, Eight serum variables, includ ing transforming growth factor-beta 1 and seven soluble membrane molec ules, were assayed with commercially available immune-enzyme methods i n the same patients, whose age and PASI scores were also recorded, The age normalization procedure improved all the correlation coefficients calculated on the lesional or non-lesional corneometric values versus the PASI scores as well as versus the other serum variables, This app roach may render corneometric determinations more useful to evaluate d isease status or treatment effect in patient groups with plaque-type p soriasis.