Several human genetic variants have been associated with susceptibility or resistance to leprosy. The aim of this study was to assess whether gene polymorphisms of -308 G/A TNF-alpha and -819 T/C IL-10 are associated with lepromatous leprosy in Mexican mestizos patients from northwest Mexico. We genotyped these polymorphisms by means of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and restriction fragment l...

The reported number of registered leprosy patients worldwide declined with the introduction of multidrug therapy. However, the emergence of rifampicin resistance in leprosy patients engenders difficulties for an individual patient, and its dissemination could pose a threat to leprosy control. This study reports an elderly patient who was diagnosed with rifampicin-resistant lepromatous leprosy. ...

SUMMARY A case of rare retinal lesion occuring in a young girl suffering from lepromatous leprosy is described. Fundus lesions in leprosy are extremely rare but do occur in some cases without causing any threat to vision. Their response to antileprotic treatment is not clearly known.

A 43-year-old woman of Mayan origin from Quintana Roo, Mexico, was diagnosed with diffuse lepromatous leprosy. The etiologic bacillus was determined to be Mycobacterium lepromatosis instead of Mycobacterium leprae. This case likely represents the first report of this leprosy form and its agent in the southeastern tip of Mexico.

Lucio’s leprosy, a non-nodular form of lepromatous leprosy, appears as uniform diffuse shiny infiltration of the entire skin. Lucio’s Phenomenon, described by Lucio and Alvarado andreported mainly in Mexico and South America, is an rare unusual ulcerative immune complex mediated vasculitis occurring in patients of non-nodular form of leprosy. Here we report a case of Lucio’s phenomenon in a 65 ...

INTRODUCTION The clinical outcomes of leprosy include complications such as physical disabilities and deformities that vary according to the degree of impairment of nerve trunks. Knowledge of the factors that lead to the development of these complications is important for disability prevention programs. This study aimed to evaluate clinical factors associated with the occurrence of physical dis...

Blood xylose concentrations were measured at 60, 90 and 120 min after 25 xylose was given orally in 33 well-nourished Papua New Guinean in-patients at Port Moresby; 12 had lepromatous (group A) and seven non-lepromatous (group B) leprosy, and 14 were controls (group C). Differences between mean xylose concentrations were not significant at any time interval. Three patients (two in group A and o...

UNLABELLED Leprosy is a chronic communicable disease since age associated with stigma and suffering. India claims its elimination but in some districts it remains a public health problem. A cross sectional study was conducted and a total of 60 persons were interviewed with an objective to assess the knowledge and attitude about leprosy among sample of 30 adults each from leprosy colony dwellers...

We prepared antigens by precipitating with 80% ammonium sulfate supernatants of human and armadillo antigen at a concentration of 160 X 10(6) bacteria per ml. The precipitate was resuspended, dialyzed and filtered. The antigen obtained was inactivated with trypsin during 30 minutes. The tests made with these antigens were negative for the 48-hour test in lepromatous patients and highly positive...

In leprosy, an infection produced by a mycobacterium, M. leprae, which is an obligatory intracellular parasite, it is the cell-mediated immunologic phenomena which intervene as defensive mechanisms, and not circulating antibodies. A high proportion of the general population is immune to the disease. It seems that in each generation there is a small group of persons susceptible to infection who ...