Maladaptive stress coping: An additional psychological factor in the process of chronification of pain or pruritus

Background: Inflammatory skin diseases with chronic pruritus and chronic back pain are very common symptoms in the general population and are associated with a reduced quality of life (QOL). In addition to biological factors, psychosocial reasons are also considered to be responsible for their development. So far, it is not known whether chronic pruritus and chronic back pain are related to maladaptive stress coping. Patients and methods: In our matched pilot case-control study with a total of 259 analyzed subjects, we compared outpatient groups, one suffering from chronic skin diseases with pruritus, the other with chronic back pain, to a healthy control group in terms of their stress copi…