Prognosis
Most patients presenting with infectious folliculitis have excellent prognosis when the infectious agent is accurately identified and appropriately treated.
While localized folliculitis progressing to systemic infection is rare in healthy individuals, this is an important consideration for immunocompromised patients.
Superficial folliculitis due to infection with Staphylococcus aureus often recurs even after appropriate treatment due to high prevalence of carrier state for Staphylococcus aureus in the general population.
For fungal folliculitis, topical therapy alone may be effective initially but the recurrence rate is high, whereas systemic antifungal therapy is likely to reduce long-term recurrence.[28]
When left untreated, most cases of superficial, infectious folliculitis are self-limited. Deep folliculitis can progress to form abscesses, which not only causes significant discomfort but can also serve as a recurrent nidus for systemic infection. Deep folliculitis also carries a risk of scarring.
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