[The psychological characteristics of patients with vitiligo]

Psychologic examinations, using the MMPI (a Multifactorial Method for Personality Investigations), of 74 patients with common vitiligo, have revealed impeded social adaptation in 63.5% and accentuation of the characterological personality traits in 29.7% of the examinees. The detected psychologic disorders of a borderline type are explained by both the presence of a manifest cosmetic defect--vitiligo, and by the individual characteristics of the patients--sex, age, type of psychologic reaction. Depigmentation and psychoemotional disorders are closely related, one stimulating the other.