Chronic cutaneous lupus erythematosus. Clinical, laboratory, therapeutic, and prognostic examination of 62 patients.

Chronic discoid lupus erythematosus (DLE) is a common condition. Sixty-two patients with biopsy-proved, active DLE were observed and their conditions were analyzed for clinical, laboratory, and therapeutic data. Fifty-six patients had disease limited to the skin-26 localized and 30 widespread (above and below the neck). At the time of follow-up examination, active disease was present in 32 patients, 28 of whom had widespread DLE. Six patients had DLE as a manifestation of systemic LE (SLE). In four patients, the DLE preceded the development of SLE. Laboratory abnormalities were substantially more common in patients with widespread DLE than in patients with localized DLE. An analysis of therapeutic results in this series confirmed the beneficial effects of intralesional corticosteroids and antimalarial agents and demonstrated relatively poor responsiveness to topical or oral corticosteroids.