[Clinical evaluation of the severity of hidradenitis suppurativa]

Treatment and long-term management of patients with chronic diseases require the use of instruments to measure severity and outcome. In the case of hidradenitis suppurativa, such instruments are currently poorly understood and utilised. Herein, we describe the main instruments, their scope of application, their qualities and their shortcomings. The Hurley classification, which was devised for surgical assessment and is limited to description of impairment at a given site, is too often used to assess overall severity in individual patients. The Sartorius score (and variants thereof) combines global and local measurements; it is widely used, but because of its hybrid nature, the global score, or PGA-HS, is currently used; the latter, focusing on inflammatory signs, is perfectly suitable for daily assessment of pharmaceutical treatment. The HiSCR score, derived from the foregoing grading system, is used as a global criterion in clinical trials. Patient-based instruments, such as pain or suppuration score, and, to a lesser extent, quality-of-life score constitute very useful supplements. Since the disease is extremely heterogeneous, no instruments cover the entire array of situations and the requirements of medical and surgical practitioners involved in the management of this patient population.