RESUMO
The study of clinical, histopathological and aetiological pattern, of lichen planus (LP) in 375 patients was done in this part of Western Rajasthan. The incidence of LP was 0.8%. 58.7% cases were male and maximum number of cases (46.93%) were in age group of 20-39 years. In 70.66% of patients only skin was involved while in 10.18% of cases only mucous membrane was involved. In 61.6% patients the lower extremities were involved. Familial LP was seen in 8 families. Association of LP was found with hypertension (2.4%), polymorphic light eruption (2.1%), vitiligo (1.9%) and diabetes mellitus (1.6%). 48.5% of cases showed lymphocytosis with raised ESR. Actinic LP was seen in 14.1% of cases. 13.1% of patients showed combination of typical LP or its variants to which term lichen planus variata was given.
RESUMO
To study the pattern of various medical diseases seen during specialist medical rural practice, we undertook an analysis of 1362 consecutive cases seen over an eight year period at a rural centre in Rajasthan. Analysis showed that infective diseases e.g. tuberculosis, acute infections, and infection related diseases of the gastrointestinal tract, skin, nervous system and heart formed the largest group with 724 patients (53.2%) as compared with chronic non-infective systemic diseases which were seen in 638 patients (46.8%). Cardiac diseases were seen in 306 patients (22.5%) which included 110 cases with ischaemic heart disease, 38 with hypertension, 110 with rheumatic heart disease, and 48 with other conditions. It is concluded that in rural practice acute and chronic infective diseases, and infection related illnesses (e.g. rheumatic heart disease) are more common than degenerative non-communicable diseases. Thus, more attention is needed in the field of infective diseases which are amenable to prevention and cure. Cardiovascular diseases form a sizeable majority of non-infective medical illnesses.
