Epidemiological and clinical features of Behçet's disease in Korea

Behçet's disease occurs with a high prevalence in the Far East including Korea. In this report we inspected 1,155 patients with Behçet's disease and collected information concerning the clinical and epidemiologic features of Behçet's disease in Korea. In summary, patients in their 30s were the most common, with the most common age of onset in the 20s; the sex ratio was 0.63:1 with female predominance; according to revised Shimizu's classification, the order of frequency of the different types was incomplete (38.2%), suspected (25.4%), possible (20.3%) and complete (16.1%); oral ulcers were the most frequent major symptom (97.5%) and the most common initial symptom (78.5%); erythema nodosum-like lesion (55.3%) was the most common type of skin lesion; a seasonal aggravation of the disease was observed in 21.3% of patients; and the most common type of childhood onset Behçet's disease was suspected type.