RESUMEN
In Iran, inpatient group psychotherapy has been limited to transient practices for research purposes or fulfilling personal interest of therapists. The goal of this paper is to share and explain the experience of developing an inpatient group psychotherapy program in Roozbeh Psychiatric Hospital, Tehran, Iran. After theoretical delineation and preparation of a draft of the program guideline, two pilot sessions were held. Based on this initial experience a final treatment guideline was prepared. Afterwards, the program was continued for more than 1 year in a female ward at Roozbeh Psychiatric Hospital. The output of this exercise was a guideline that covers important topics in development of inpatient group psychotherapy. It is concluded that inpatient group psychotherapy has its unique challenges. Of the most important challenges that can be mentioned in this regard are the participation of patients with significant differences in levels of psychopathology and psychiatric signs and symptoms, and high comorbidity with specific personality traits or disorders. Other challenges relevant to the structure of the group include items such as very limited time for working through and inevitable out-of-group contacts.
RESUMEN
BACKGROUND: Facial involvement in psoriasis is accomplished with poor prognosis. In this study, clinical features and severity of psoriasis were compared between facial and nonfacial psoriasis involvement groups in Iran. It also evaluated these characteristics in different subtypes of facial psoriasis. METHODS: One hundred and thirty- eight psoriatic patients having referred to our clinic entered in this cross- sectional study in 2006 - 2007. Medical information, whole body and scalp Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) scores were obtained. Variables were compared between the facial and nonfacial involvement groups and also in different subtypes of the former including peripherofacial (PF), centrofacial (CF), and mixedfacial (MF). A P-value of < 0.05 was considered as significant. RESULTS: We found 55.0% facial involvement in Iranian psoriatic patients. MF (52.6%), CF (28.9%), and PF (18.4%), respectively were the common forms of facial involvement. The median whole body and scalp PASI scores, the number of male participants, and tongue involvement were significantly higher in patients with facial involvement. Comparing different subtypes of facial psoriasis, whole body PASI and scalp PASI scores were significantly higher in MF subtype and lower in CF subtype. Despite the least severity in the latter subtype, psoriatic arthritis and geographic tongue were shown to be more common in this subtype. Moreover, relapse history was correlated with PF subtype. CONCLUSIONS: Facial involvement in psoriasis had significantly higher whole body and scalp PASI scores in Iran which may be an indication of more severe disease. This difference was more prominent in MF subtype.
