Gaining a comprehensive understanding of pruritus

Pruritus is a common symptom associated with many dermatoses, systemic abnormalities, and psychiatric / psychosomatic diseases. Additionally, pruritus is one of the most intractable symptoms due to its complex pathogenesis involving an increasing number of mediators and receptors, undefined neurophysiologic pathways, unclear cerebral processing, and psychophysiology interaction. Clinically, the first challenge of dermatologists is how to get general and interdisciplinary vision of pruritus and to preliminarily figure it out whether there might be underlying systemic or psychosocial disorders. The second challenge is to select efficient individual tailored anti-pruritic treatment, which includes targeted drugs and cognitive-behavioral therapy.