DOI: 10.36347/sjams.2016.v04i10.060

Pages: 3853-3855

Superficial mycoses able to spread readily though direct contact with infected people, animals, clothing, brushes, and other objects. Generally, the fungi tend to grow in moist parts of the body. The present study was done to study the prevalence of the superficial fungal infection of the skin. This study was undertaken on the patients visiting to the dermatology department of the SMBT medical college, Dhamangaon, Ghoti, Nasik, with any type of skin lesions. The study was done over a period of 1 year. A detailed case history of patient was recorded, including age, sex, duration of illness, size of the lesion, any treatment taken and site of lesion. Clinical diagnosis of the lesion was maintained. Two sample collection methods were used in this particular study: In first method, after cleaning of the affected site with isopropyl alcohol, samples consisting of infected hairs and epidermal scales were scraped from the scalp and rim of lesions using a sterile scalpel blade. The scrapings were collected on a piece of sterile brown paper. In the second method, moist cotton swabs were taken to collect pus from inflammatory lesions. Direct microscopic examination of the scrapping was done by placing on a microscope slide with one or two drop of 20% potassium hydroxide (KOH). Each scraping was also cultured into Sabouraud’s Dextrose agar. Total 139 patients were reported to the dermatology department with the complaint of skin lesion and their samples were collected. According to the positivity to the KOH mounting, most of the males (63%) were positive for the KOH and females (11%) were less positive for the KOH. Site-wise distribution of the patients had shown that, hands and legs were the most common site affected...................