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Leprosy Training - Pagadian City

​​     Leprosy is a chronic infectious disease caused by Mycobacterium leprae, an acid-fast, rod-shaped bacillus that mainly affects the skin, peripheral nerves, mucosa of the upper respiratory tract and eyes.

Leprosy Training - Zamboanga Sibugay

Leprosy Training - Dipolog City

Leprosy Training - Zamboanga City

THE ORGANISM ( Mycobacterium leprae )

  - Gerhard Hansen demonstrated the organism for the first

    time in 1873.

 - Morphology: a slow growing rod-shaped acid fast bacillus

 - Doubling time: 2 weeks

 

​CHARACTERISTICS
- does not grow in laboratory media
- only grows in mice, armadillo, monkey & man

​​

HABITAT
Schwann cell of peripheral nerves
Skin and Mucous membrane

​

​

Mode of Transmission:

 

Respiratory – droplet infection in 95% of cases
Skin – open wounds in 5% of cases

​

Diagnosis of leprosy:

suspected in people with any of the 
    following signs and symptoms:
1. pale or reddish patches on the skin

    (the most common sign of leprosy)
2. loss or decrease of
   feeling in the skin patch​

3. numbness or tingling of the hands or feet

4. weakness of the hands, feet or eyelids

5. painful wounds (ulcers) on the hands   
    and feet

6. painful or tender peripheral nerves

7. swellings or lumps in
   the face or earlobes

Gerhard Armauer Hansen demonstrated the organism for

the first time in 1873​

LEPROSY
(HANSEN’S DISEASE)

Diagnosis of leprosy: Leprosy is diagnosed by finding at least  one of the following cardinal signs:​

- Loss of sensation of skin patch
- Enlargement of peripheral nerves
- Presence of acid-fast bacilli in a slit skin smear

TREATMENT OF LEPROSY​

Multi-Drug Therapy (MDT)

WHAT IS MDT?

    -  Multi-Drug Therapy (MDT) is the accepted

       standard treatment for leprosy.

 

    -  It is a combination of two (2) or more

       anti-leprosy drugs:

​         Dapsone,   Rifampicin,  Clofazimine

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