Chronic mucocutaneous candidosis and other superficial and systemic mycoses successfully treated with ketoconazole

Abstract

Four patients with chronic mucocutaneous candidosis from early infancy were treated successfully with ketoconazole given orally. All thrush lesions were clinically and mycologically cured within a few days of treatment with 100-400 micrograms of ketoconazole daily; skin lesions were cured within a few weeks, and nails were cured after about three months of treatment. Delayed cutaneous hypersensitivity to candidin was acquired by the third month. Cellular and humoral immunologic responses were related to the suppression of Candida albicans antigen by ketoconazole. A fifth patient with chronic lingual granuloma due to C. albicans improved considerably. Favorable results also were seen in individual patients with oral and disseminated histoplasmosis due to Histoplasma capsulatum; laryngeal, pulmonary, and hepatic disease with continuous fever also due to H. capsulatum; pulmonary histoplasmosis due to Histoplasma duboisii; cutaneous sporotrichosis; and cutaneous blastomycosis due to Blastomyces dermatitidis and in three patients with favus due to Trichophyton schoenleinii; six of seven patients with tinea capitis due to Trichophyton violaceum (after one month of treatment); and four patients with infections due to Petriellidium boydii, Phialophora pedrosoi, or Beauveria species. All patients responded rapidly to 400 mg of ketoconazole per day given orally. Only the patient with hepatic histoplasmosis required 800 mg per day. Measurements of ketoconazole in the serum during treatment were useful in the evaluation of therapy.