Demographic evaluation of neutrophilic scarring alopecia in Razi Hospital in Tehran in 2005-2009

Cicatricial alopecia is characterized by permanent destruction of the pilosebaceous unit, leading to irreversible hair loss, and has primary and secondary types. Primary type, based on predominant inflammatory infiltration in histology, is divided to neutrophilic, lymphocytic and mix types. Decalvans folliculitis, dissecting cellulitis and acne keloidalis are 3 subtypes of neutrophilic group. In this study frequency of each subtype and the distribution of age, gender and duration of disease have been reviewed.

This retrospective study was performed on patients with clinical diagnosis of cicatricial alopecia and histologic confirmation referred to Razi hospital in Tehran in 2005-2009.

Of 135 patients with mean (mean±SD) age of 32±10.6 years, 71.9% were male and 28.1% were female. The diagnoses included decalvans folliulitis (72.6%) with mean age of 31.89 years, dissecting cellulitis (25.0%) with mean age of 32.4 years and acne keloidalis (1.5%) with mean age of 52 years. The mean duration of disease was 4.2±3.9 years (4.08 years in male and 4.7 years in female). The mean duration of disease in decalvans folliulitis was 4.7, in dissecting cellulitis was 1.9 and in acne keloidalis was 17.5 years.

Neutrophilic scarring alopecia is more common in men and in the third decade of age and the most common type is decalvans folliulitis.