An-Najah Staff

Background: Dermatophytes are a group of morphologically and physiologically related molds some of which cause well defined infections: dermatophytoses (tineas or ringworm) .They have two important properties: they are keratinophilic and keratinolytic. This means they have the ability to digest keratin in vitro in their saprophytic state and utilize it as a substrate and some of them can invade tissues in vivo and cause tineas. Objectives: This study was designed to determine the epidemiology including prevalence and occurrence of causative agents of dermatophytosis in patients in Palestine; detecting any changes in the etiological agents during the last 28 years; studying the effective factors such as socioeconomic condition, age, contact with animals and others; studying the correlation between multifocal infections tinea pedis , tinea nail and tinea cruris. The study was also aimed at genotyping identification and how can be used as a molecular tool for rapid diagnosis for dermatophytes also to study the diversity during different dermatophytes species and within the same specie specially Microsporum canis, Trichophyton rubrum and Trichophyton mentagrophytes. Genetic studies by random amplification of polymorphic DNA (RAPD) have been used to detect polymorphism of dermatophytes. The genotypical analysis was performed using the RAPD method as rapid molecular tool for diagnosis. Results: In this study, a total number of 220 samples from 188 patients were examined ((137 males (72.9%), and 51 females (27.1%)). Tinea Capitis (27.7%) was the predominant clinical manifestation followed by tinea pedis (23.4%), tinea nail (22.3%), tinea cruris (20.2%) and tinea corporis(6.4%). The dominant causative agent was Microsporum canis 104 samples from 138 (75.36%) followed by Trichophyton rubrum 31 samples from 138 (22.5%) then Trichophyton mentagrophytes 3 samples from 138 (2.1%). The RAPD results showed that all analyzed strains are mainly from three genotypes of Microsporum canis, two genotypes of Trichophyton rubrum and one genotype of Trichophyton mentagrophytes. Thus, based on analysis of the RAPD data, a correlation can be shown between the genotypical patterns of the strains of Microsporum canis also between the strains of Trichophyto rubrum and Trichophyton mentagrophytes from Palestine. Conclusions: The results showed that the predominant causative agent of dermatophytes specis was Microsporum canis. This change could be due to several factors as activity related to human and animals’ hygiene, interaction between human and human, animal and soil, and changing population over the times.