Epidermomicosis tricofitoide y en placas generalizadas por un «cladosporium»

Abstract

The authors refer to an observation of a case of epidermidomycosis which started about 6 months ago in the left leg of a youngster of 15 years of age, which later extended to the upper and lower extremities, to the trunk and neck, running up to the scalp. The eruption started as red punctiform maculae and scalelike formations which grew extending as trichophytic patches, in isolated or confluent forms, covering ample extensions of the skin in patches of geographic contours. The patches were red or somewhat pale, covered with scales, at times visible and somewhat whitish looking, or rather it could have been produced by the scratch of the curett. The palms of the hands and the soles of the feet and the nails were respected. In the scalp the pityriasic state was very prououuced. On examining the scales in caustic solution of potassium 40 °/0 showed mycotic corpuscles of conidial nature of 1 to 4-5 microns, some fragment of mycelium of 4 microns diameter and 20 of length. There were also ovoid forms of 16 microns. In Sabouraud's glucosed agar there developed cultures of compact colonies of dark olive-green colour, and mycelium radiated in the periphery of opaque whitish gray colour, with slight raising of the surfaces along with some depressions. With time they became dark, taking a blackish creen tint until almost black. The direct examination of there same colonies showed mycelial threads ramified and covered, some of them ended in short chains of conidia arranged in larger to smaller, the end chain being the smaller. The conidia are also born of the fragmentation of the uniformly covered mycelium. All conidia have tendency to cluster. They are of the size of 4 to 6 microns in diameter, or some are of greater length, eliptical, branched ofi, once, twice, or thrice with delicate extremities. They have the olive colour of the colonies. The authors identifield the isolated fungus as the cladosporium herbarum (Link), and they believe this is the first epidermidomycosis due to this fungus.