Psoriatic scarring alopecia: observations in four patients

Background and design Although acute or chronic hair loss in psoriasis of t he scalp can be a symptom of the disease, until now there has been no agree ment as to whether or not it is only restricted to erythrodermic, generaliz ed pustular and scalp plaque psoriasis. The purpose of this study was to ev aluate patients with chronic scalp psoriasis and alopecia and to determine if the alopecia was of the scarring type. Results We report four cases of p soriatic scarring alopecia and describe the clinical and histologic feature s of these patients, The diagnosis was made by scalp biopsies (vertical and transverse sections) and other causes of scarring alopecia were excluded. Conclusions Psoriasis can cause scarring alopecia.