Faye O, Keita M, N'diaye H-T, Konare H-D, Darie H, Keita S, Mahe A
Service de Dermatologie, CNAM, Bamako, Mali.
Ann Dermatol Venereol. 2003 Feb;130(2 Pt 1):199-201.
Noma is a necrotic stomatitis, frequent in undernourished children in tropical countries. Its occurrence in adults is extremely rare and has recently been described during AIDS. We report two new cases.
The first patient, a 37 year-old farmer, consulted for a mutilating ulcer of the commissure of the right lip. The second patient, a 25 year-old woman, consulted for an ulcerating and necrotic tumefaction of the left cheek. Anamnesis reconstructed the chronology of the lesions and a cutaneous biopsy revealed non-specific ulcers. The status of health of both patients was poor and they both exhibited positive HIV serology.
The diagnosis of noma is easy and based on clinical manifestations. The characteristic aspect is that of a mutilating ulcer of the face with conventional progression: tumefaction, followed by ulceration and finally elimination necrosis. This disease predominates in children. Its discovery in adults is a sign of poor prognosis because it may reveal an HIV infection at the AIDS stage.
It is important to draw the attention of practitioners on the interest of performing HIV serology when confronted with an adult exhibiting a noma, and to evoke a noma when confronted with a tumefaction of the face rapidly progressing towards necrosis.
