Effects of Camouflage on the Life Quality of Patients With Vitiligo

Vitiligo is a common depigmented skin disease characterized by destruction of functional melanocyte. The global incidence is about 0.5-2.0% and prevalence be about 0.8-1.5% in China. Studies showed that almost half of vitiligo patients had developed depigmentation before 20 years old. Lesions involving exposed skin such as face, hand or mucous always make patients feeling embarrassment, so the impaired quality of life (QoL) have greater impact on patients with vitiligo than the disease itself. Besides, Vitiligo is also a psychosomatic disease as its cause stress or depression which can induce dysfunction of endocrine system or immune system in patients, finally resulted in poor curative effects and relapse of the disease which further aggravates stress and depression in patients. Furthermore, traditional Chinese medicine suggested that uneasiness would be a cause of vitiligo as well.

It is of great value to explore therapeutic methods that can effectively control disease, improve appearance, relieve patients' pain and improve their quality of life. Dermatologists of Japan and European suggested that camouflage would be a proper way to improve patients' appearance and it should be an effective supplement to the treatments of vitiligo.

With the transformation of the medical model from a simple biomedical model to a bio-psychological-social medical model, observing changes of lesion in vitiligo may not fully reflect the impact of vitiligo on patients. Therefore, it is necessary to develop some evaluation methods to reflect the impact of vitiligo in patients. Among the various measurement tools, universality scales have a wide range of measurement and can be applied to different groups of people to understand the general health status of the general population. But there are some limitations due to the unspecifically designed for a disease group. When the universal scale is applied to a specific disease, it does not have specificity. Some clinically significant information on quality of life may be omitted, and the QOL cannot be sensitively reflected. The scales in the dermatology area were developed for patients with dermatological diseases and reflect the differences between skin diseases and other system diseases. However, the specificity and sensitivity of specific diseases are still not strong enough.The problem is the lack of a vitiligo life quality evaluation scale with Chinese characteristics for us. Therefore, it is necessary for the investigator to compile a vitiligo quality of life scale that is simple, feasible and applicable to China's national conditions. Meanwhile the reliability analysis must be carried out to bring better quality of life assessment tools to patients with vitiligo in China.

Camouflage is an emerging solution to improve patients' appearance which showing a great potential in treatment of vitiligo. Diagnosis and treatment of vitiligo consensus (2014 edition) made by the dermatological department of the Chinese medical association also suggest that camouflage can be used on exposed skin such as face, neck, hands or feet.The first commercial camouflage agent in China is CapulinTM by 2004, Its formula contains natural plant extracts, moisturizers, emollients and natural pigments. The regimented mechanism is to combine the camouflage with the free protein on the cuticle and finally format the mimic human natural melanin, which is extremely similar to normal skin tone. Previous studies recommended that CapulinTM showing a good cover effect on vitiligo, but the effects of camouflage on the QoL of patients with vitiligo in Chinese population is unknown. Thus, the investigators undergo a randomized open-label controlled study to estimate the effects of CapulinTM on QoL of patients with vitiligo.