Disseminated Leishmaniasis: Clinical, immunological, and therapeutic aspects

✍ Scribed by Maria Elisa Alves Rosa; Paulo Roberto Lima Machado

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2011
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 182 KB
• Volume: 72
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0272-4391
• DOI: 10.1002/ddr.20450

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

Disseminated leishmaniasis (DL) is a distinct, severe, and emerging form of American tegumentary leishmaniasis. DL has been characterized by more than 10 multiple and pleomorphic cutaneous lesions, distributed in more than two noncontiguous parts of the body. Mucosal involvement is detected in up to 44% of cases. The development of the DL involves a complex and poorly understood network involving parasite, host immune response, and the environment, where L. braziliensis polymorphism plays a major role. A decrease in the type 1 immune response in the peripheral blood of DL patients appears to be caused by the attraction of Leishmania‐activated T cells to the multiple cutaneous lesions. DL is a difficult to cure disease and failure to pentavalent antimony therapy is observed in at least 60% of cases. Drug Dev Res 72:437–441, 2011. © 2011 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.