CLINICAL MANIFESTATIONS OF MEASLES IN GENERAL DENTAL PRACTICE

Despite of general tendency towards the decrease in the incidence of measles and rubella in recent years, there have been registered several outbreaks of these infections among young adults and adolescents at present. This case report describes a clinical case of measles suspected at the dental examination. The aim of this study is to make a clinical diagnosis of the patient and to draw attention of the dental professional and general physicians to the relevance of this problem. The prodromal phase of measles can be quite variable and mimic the clinical picture of other diseases, as it happened in our case, when the patient went to the dental office for symptoms of acute serous periodontitis. Belsky — Filatov — Koplik’s spots are reported to usually appear in 37.7-64.3% of cases (at the beginning of the measles rash period). In 57.5% of cases there is spot enanthema on the soft palate mucosa. Our patient presented only signs of acute catarrhal stomatitis. We would like to emphasize that 100% of patients with measles have catarrhal syndrome manifested with moderate signs of nasopharyngitis (nasal congestion, sore throat, dry cough), and only 42.8% suffer from conjunctivitis. This makes it difficult to diagnose this disease in its early period or to make differential diagnosis in the prodromal phase. An infected person can transmit the virus within 4 days before and after the rash appears that is very dangerous for surrounding people and for healthcare workers in particular. When making a diagnosis, it is important to remember that measles is a clinical diagnosis, and there is no opportunity to carry out an indicative rapid diagnosis (as with the flu), therefore every doctor should consider the issue of timely vaccination, and promotes preventive and educational work among the population.