Bullying More Prevalent Among Adolescents With AD

Adolescents with atopic dermatitis (AD) experience bullying significantly more often than their peers without AD.

Adolescents with AD have reported appearance-based bullying.
To evaluate the association between AD and the prevalence and frequency of bullying, researchers analyzed cross-sectional data from adult caregivers of US adolescents aged 12 to 17 years who participated in the 2021 National Health Interview Survey.
Logistic regression and ordinal logistic regression were used to compare the prevalence of experiencing one or more bullying encounters during the previous 12 months and the frequency of bullying between adolescents with and those without AD.

A total of 3207 adolescents were included in the analysis. The mean age of the participants was 14.5 years, and 11.9% currently had AD. The prevalence of experiencing bullying was significantly higher among adolescents with AD compared with those without AD (33.2% vs 19%; P < .001), as was the prevalence of cyberbullying (9.1% vs 5.8%; P = .04).
Following adjustment for demographics and atopic comorbidities, adolescents with AD were at increased odds of bullying compared with their peers without AD (adjusted odds ratio [AOR], 1.99; 95% CI, 1.45 – 2.73).
Following adjustment for demographics, adolescents with AD were also at increased odds of cyberbullying compared with their peers without AD (AOR, 1.65; 95% CI, 1.04 – 2.62), but no association was observed following adjustment for atopic comorbidities (AOR, 1.27; 95% CI, 0.82 – 1.96).
Following ordinal logistic regression that was adjusted for demographics and atopic comorbidities, adolescents with AD were at greater odds of being bullied at a higher frequency compared with their peers without AD (AOR, 1.97; 95% CI, 1.44 – 2.68).

“Larger, future studies using clinical AD diagnoses and adolescent self-report can advance understanding of bullying and AD,” the researchers wrote. “Clinicians, families, and schools should address and monitor bullying among adolescents.”

Howa Yeung, MD, of the Department of Dermatology at Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, Georgia, led the research. The study was published online October 25, 2023, in JAMA Dermatology.

Limitations include the study’s cross-sectional design. In addition, the investigators could not directly attribute bullying to skin-specific findings, and it was a caregiver report.

The study was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health and the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases. One of the authors, Joy Wan, MD, received grants from Pfizer and personal fees from Janssen and Sun Pharmaceuticals outside of the submitted work.

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