leprosy & actinomycoses

• Leprosy is a chronic granulomatous disease, also known as Hansen's disease, caused by bacterium Mycobacterium leprae
• Mycobacterium leprae is weakly acid-fast, found within Virchow’s cells, and has a cigar bundle appearance
• mode of infection:

  1. nasal droplet infection
  2. direct contact: person-to-person transmission
  3. intimate and prolonged contact
• Leprosy can lead to skin lesions, muscle weakness, paralysis, disfigurements, mutilation, and even blindness
• Leprosy can be classified based on the immune status of the host, with Ridley Jopling classification dividing it into tuberculoid (TT) and lepromatous (LL)
• Tuberculoid leprosy is characterized by intact cellular immunity, few localized lesions, and few bacilli, while lepromatous leprosy has impaired immunity, nodular skin lesions, and numerous bacilli
• Laboratory diagnosis of leprosy includes slit skin smear examination, skin biopsy, nasal mucosal scrapings, and nerve biopsy
• The lepromin test is used for disease classification, immune status assessment, and prognosis assessment in leprosy
• Actinomycosis is caused by Gram-positive, branching, filamentous bacteria like Actinomyces and Nocardia, they resemble fungi
• Actinomycosis presents with slowly developing swelling, painless sinus tracts, and hard, yellow granules composed of actinomyces filaments
• Laboratory diagnosis of actinomycosis involves microscopic examination, cultural isolation, species identification through biochemical tests or automated methods, and molecular methods like PCR
• culture of M.leprae

  1. mouse food pad
  2. nine banded armadillo