Mycobacterium avium-Mycobacterium intracellulare Infection Limited to the Skin and Lymph Nodes in Patients with AIDS

Three patients with AIDS who were taking 3'-azido-3'-deoxythymidine (AZT) developed cutaneous abscesses from which Mycobacterium avium-Mycobacterium intracellulare was isolated. Culture of multiple blood samples and bone marrow aspirate from all three patients revealed that the infection was not disseminated. This is a rare form of presenta-tion for this infection in AIDS patients. We speculate that the antiviral drug AZT was responsible for the localization of disease. Mycobacterium avium-Mycobacterium intracel-lulare (MAl) infection was first diagnosed pre-mortem in patients with AIDS in 1982 [1, 2]. Since then it has become increasingly recognized, and its disseminated form is a frequent terminal event in pa-tients with AIDS. Young et al. [3] described MAl infection as a disease that is usually disseminated at the time of diagnosis in AIDS patients, with 80% of the patients they reported having MAl in multi