Suffering from
Dissecting Cellulitis

What is Dissecting Cellulitis?

Dissecting Cellulitis is another rare chronic scalp condition. This autoimmune disease causes progressive degeneration of the scalp. People will this disease faces incredible discomfort and disfigurement to the scalp and prolonged conditions can lead to squamous cell carcinoma, a type of skin cancer. It mostly affects people with African origins aged between 18 to 40 years.

Medical Symptoms

Usually, this condition starts off with Folliculitis, another type of milder skin problem. Slowly, it will progress and cause

• Pustules or lesions surrounding the follicles
• Fluctuant nodules (congregation of loose skin)
• Sinus tract formations ( cavities under the infection)

Progressively, the inflammation will lead to hair follicles shock (Telogen Effluvium) and you will end up with bald patches. You might also find blood fluids leaking from the nodules.

It's best to properly diagnose this condition because it can mimic and resemble other types of scalp diseases such as Tinea Capitis, Discoid Lupus and other types of Scarring Alopecia.

What Causes Dissecting Cellulitis?

Like most kind of autoimmune diseases, the mechanism for this condition is relatively unknown. Follicular blockage and closure are one of the main speculations. Due to the blockage, the hair follicle's sebaceous gland that discharges an oily substance known as 'sebum' accumulates and causes opening and rupture of the follicle resulting in an autoimmune response by Neutrophilic cells (white blood cells). Secondary bacterial infection such as staph can occur but they are not the main reason for the problem.

Seeking Medical Treatment

This kind of Scarring Alopecia is quite hard to treat. The most common prescription for this disease is

• Topical antibiotics
• Zinc
• Oral Isotrenin (for severe acne)
• Oral antibiotics
• Steroids
• Dapsone
• Kenalog
• X-ray therapy
• Laser therapy

You might want to try laser therapy by using Nd:YAG lasers, which are used for a lot of common problems such as Post Cataract correction and hair removal. Surgery is your last resort towards severe or unresponsive cases.

You should get immediate medical attention once you notice there are lesions or Folliculitis in your scalp. Treating this early gives you the ultimate edge to handle this problem!