BACKGROUND: Psoriasis vulgaris is a skin autoimmune disease. Psoriatic patients have significantly lowered life expectancy and suffer from various comorbidities. The main goal of the study was to determine whether psoriatic patients experience accelerated aging. As accelerated aging might be the reason for the higher prevalence of comorbidities at lower chronological ages, we also wanted to investigate the relationship between aging and selected parameters of frequent psoriatic comorbidities - endocan, vascular endothelial growth factor and interleukin-17. Samples were obtained from 28 patients and 42 healthy controls. Epigenetic age measurement was based on the Horvath clock. The levels of endocan, vascular endothelial growth factor and interleukin-17 were analyzed using standardized ELISA methods. RESULTS: The difference between the epigenetic age and the chronological age of each individual subject did not increase with the increasing chronological age of patients. We cannot conclude that psoriasis causes accelerated aging. However, the epigenetic and chronological age difference was significantly higher in female patients than in female controls, and the difference was correlated with endocan (r = 0.867, p = 0.0012) and vascular endothelial growth factor (r = 0.633, p = 0.0365) only in female patients. CONCLUSIONS: The findings suggest a possible presence of pathophysiological processes that occur only in female psoriatic patients. These processes make psoriatic females biologically older and might lead to an increased risk of comorbidity occurrence. This study also supports the idea that autoimmune diseases cause accelerated aging, which should be further explored in the future.

Clinic of Dermatology and Venereology University Hospital Hradec Kralove Hradec Kralove Czech Republic

Institute of Clinical Biochemistry and Diagnostics University Hospital Hradec Kralove and Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove Charles University Hradec Kralove Czech Republic

Institute of Clinical Immunology and Allergology University Hospital and Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove Charles University Hradec Kralove Czech Republic

Institute of Pathological Physiology Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove Charles University Hradec Kralove Czech Republic

Institute of Preventive Medicine Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove Charles University Simkova 870 50038 Hradec Kralove Czech Republic

Transfusion Center University Hospital 500 03 Hradec Kralove Czech Republic

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Telomere length, oxidative and epigenetic changes in blood DNA of patients with exacerbated psoriasis vulgaris

Chromosomal Aberrations and Oxidative Stress in Psoriatic Patients with and without Metabolic Syndrome

Significantly Altered Serum Levels of NAD, AGE, RAGE, CRP, and Elastin as Potential Biomarkers of Psoriasis and Aging-A Case-Control Study