Borderline lepromatous leprosy with primary clinical manifestation in a patient with a long-term dermatological history

Abstract

Despite the low number, the cases of leprosy continue to be detected, more often on endemic territories. In Russian Federation one of the endemic territories is located in Astrakhan region. The long incubation period eventually leads to inability to identify the source of infection. The combination of the leprosy with other dermatoses complicates the diagnosing. The isolated and early skin manifestations of leprosy can be mistaken for the clinical features of other dermatoses. This article presents the description of a case study of border line lepromatosis leprosy in a patient with a long-term dermatological background. A 66-year-old male was followed up for 14 years under different dermatological diseases. In 2017, after a change in the nature of rashes, atypical for supervised nosological forms, and in connection with the resistance of clinical manifestations of diseases to the therapy, a clinical diagnosis of leprosy was established. To verify this diagnosis, the patient was sent to the Federal State Budgetary Institution "Research Institute for the Study of Leprosy". At admission, he complained of rashes on the skin of the face, trunk, extremities, accompanied by itching, swelling, weakness and numbness in the distal extremities. As a result of clinical, laboratory examination (bacterioscopic examination of scarification from the skin, serological examination, pathomorphological examination of skin biopsies), the diagnosis of the underlying disease was made: leprosy, borderline lepromatous form, active stage. Complications of the underlying disease: chronic specific polyneuropathy with sensitive disorders. The described clinical situation illustrates the problem of early diagnosis of leprosy due to the variety of manifestations and low alertness of clinicians.

Keywords

• leprosy
• mycobacterium leprae
• differential diagnosis
• comorbidities
• case report