An original exploration of genital lichen sclerosus: the semantic connectivity map

Background - Genital lichen sclerosus (GLS) is a distressing chronic inflammatory disease of unknown aetiology. Objective - We reanalysed the data of a multicentre Italian study on GLS by adopting a semantic connectivity map approach in order to explore the complex connections among patients’ demographic and clinical variables. Methods - Associations among data of 729 GLS patients were analysed by means of an algorithm that is able to compute and display the most relevant correlations between variables taking into account the effect of other covariates in the system. Results - Three major hubs of variable aggregation were identified, namely male gender, female gender, and age >60 years. Males were associated with no or minimal disease-related symptoms, young age at inclusion, short delay in diagnosis, and treatment with moisturizers. Females were associated with severe symptoms, pharmacological treatments, and extra-genital LS. Age over 60 was associated with comorbidities and longer GLS duration. Conclusion - Gender seems to be a major determinant of GLS, in terms of both disease course and symptom severity. Symptom profile represents the main criterion for treatment choice.