Mycobacterium abscessus scalp infection after hair transplantation in Central America

Although M.  abscessus is prevalent throughout the world, the incidence of infection can vary.1 Regions such as East Asia and the islands in the south and central Pacific Ocean have been shown to have higher rates of M. [...] absces- sus infections.1,2 In British Columbia, the incidence of nontuber- Figure 1: Scalp of a 53-year-old man with Mycobacterium abscessus infec- culous mycobacteria (NTM) pulmonary disease is lower than in tion after incision and drainage of scalp nodules (with quarter-inch rib- other regions and is about 1.6 out of 100 000, with cutaneous bon packing strips in situ), 2 months after hair transp. [...] By this time, he had substan- plexity of antimicrobial resistance.13 tial improvement in the erythema and swelling of the nodules A case series of 6 surgical site infections caused by NTMs in (Figure 2). [...] Alta.; Department of Medicine (Peters), Divi- distributed in accordance with the terms of the sion of Infectious Diseases, University of Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY-NC-ND The authors have obtained patient consent. [...] British Columbia, Vancouver, BC 4.0) licence, which permits use, distribution Affiliations: Department of Pharmaceutical Contributors: All of the authors contributed and reproduction in any medium, provided Sciences (Chow), Vancouver General Hospi- to the conception and design of the work, that the original publication is properly cited, tal; Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Uni- drafted the ma.