Background: Chloroquine may improve cutaneous symptoms and liver disease manifestations in patients with porphyria cutanea tarda.
Aim: To retrospectively analyze the effects of choloroquine in patients with porphyria cutanea tarda.
Patients and methods: Five patients (one female), aged 45 to 65 years old, were studied. The duration of the disease ranged from 2 to 15 years. One patient was alcoholic and other was a hepatitis C virus carrier. All patients received chloroquine 125 mg twice weekly. Before, during and after treatment, cutaneous signs, serum bilirubin, hepatic enzymes and urine copro and uroporphyrin were assessed. Four patients were subjected to a liver biopsy before starting chloroquine.
Results: All patients had increased levels of urine porphyrins, four had abnormal serum liver enzymes. All liver biopsies showed variable hemosiderosis, two patients had a chronic active hepatitis (one with cirrhosis), one a chronic persistent hepatitis and one had mild rague alterations. During chloroquine treatment, cutaneous symptoms improved in all patients, transaminases and gamma glutamyl transferase decreased. In three, urine uroporphyrin increased initially and normalized afterwards. Choloroquine was well tolerated.
Conclusions: Chloroquine improved cutaneous symptoms, urine uroporphyrin and serum liver enzyme levels in treated patients.