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Histopathological study of apparently normal skin of patients with leprosy
Author(s) -
ElDarouti Mohammad A.,
Hussein Soliman,
Marzouk Salonaz A.,
Nabil Naglaa,
Hunter Nahla S.,
Mahgoub Duaa,
ElEishi Nermine H.,
AbdelHalim Mona R. E.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
international journal of dermatology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.677
H-Index - 93
eISSN - 1365-4632
pISSN - 0011-9059
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-4632.2005.02632.x
Subject(s) - leprosy , medicine , lepromatous leprosy , dermatology , pathological , incidence (geometry) , pathology , disease , tuberculoid leprosy , mycobacterium leprae , physics , optics
Background Several clinical and laboratory observations point to the possible microscopical affection of normal‐looking skin in leprosy. Objective This study was carried out to verify the microscopical affection of apparently normal‐looking skin in different types of leprosy. Patients and methods The study included 50 patients with different clinical types of leprosy. Biopsies from both skin lesions and normal‐looking skin were obtained from each patient and examined for microscopical evidence of leprosy. Results Microscopical affection of normal‐looking skin was detected in 52% of our cases, with higher incidence of affection towards the lepromatous end of the disease. Conclusion Our findings underscore that the incidence of microscopical affection of normal‐looking skin in leprosy is much higher on the lepromatous end of the spectrum of leprosy than on the tuberculoid end; during treatment, the leprosy granulomas may disappear from the normal skin before the clinical lesions. Moreover, the microscopic picture of indeterminate leprosy can be observed in the normal‐looking skin of patients with tuberculoid leprosy or lepromatous leprosy, and this description appears not to be confined to the entity known as indeterminate leprosy.