HISTOPATHOLOGICAL STUDY OF LEPROSY

Introduction: Leprosy or Hansen's disease is a chronic infectious disease that mainly affects skin and peripheral nerves. Histopathology and demonstration of lepra bacilli is a vital tool to supplement clinical examination and diagnosis for correct classication and therefore treatment of patients. 1.To study the histopathological features of leprosy in skin biopsies and to categorize th Aims: em into various types based on microscopy. 2.To determine the bacillary index in each case. Material And Method: Skin biopsies after adequate xation in 10% of formalin, were routinely processed and parafn embedded section of 5 µm thickness were stained with Hematoxylene -Eosin and Fite- Faraco (FF) stain and were studied by microscopic examination further typing of leprosy was done and bacillary index was determined by studying FF stained sections. Result: Total 84 Skin biopsies diagnosed as leprosy and were studied over a period of two years. Male to Female ratio of patients was 2.65:1 and maximum th number of cases were seen in the 4 decade of life. Lepromatous leprosy (28 Cases) and tuberculoid leprosy (28 Cases) were most common type of leprosy, followed by borderline lepromatous leprosy (15 Cases), histoid leprosy (11 Cases), indeterminate (2 Cases) and borderline tuberculoid leprosy (1 Case). There were 13 biopies with lepra reaction, 12 of erythema nodosum leprosum and 1of type 1 reaction. In present study, Bacillary index of Lepromatus leprosy is 4-5, Histoid leprosy is 6-8 and of Tuberculoid leprosy is 2-3. Conclusion: Histological examination along with bacillary index are gold standard for accurate diagnosis and typing of leprosy as well as for the management of patient.