In the present study, two geographically different locations were studied. Geographically, northern and southern regions of India are distinct in terms of environmental conditions. M. restricta and M. globosa were the two most prevalent species isolated from dandruff patients of northern India having moderate to severe lesions while M. furfur, M. restricta and M. globosa were either isolated singly or in mixture from patients from southern India. In Japan and USA, M. globosa is most frequently isolated from dandruff cases followed by M. restricta13. Whereas M. furfur and M. slooffiae are isolated from scalp of healthy individuals and are considered as commensal species. In the present study, the sample collectionassociated both with lesional and non-lesional area of Japanese SD/D patients. In the present study, isolation rate of Malassezia spp. was 74 per cent in northern India and 94 per cent from southern India patients.
Though association of dandruff is related to the species of Malassezia implicated, presence of this yeast in high number is also related in causation of dandruff. In a culture dependant study, Gupta et al17 showed higher number of Malassezia colony at non-lesional site than on the lesional site. But, in DNA based study Malassezia found at lesional site was higher in density than on non-lesional site20. In a few reports the quantity of yeasts was not found to be correlate positively with the severity of the disease4,21. In the present study, the higher colony count positively associated with the severity of dandruff. It is also important to note that accurate quantification of Malassezia on the scalp is difficult to perform as the Malassezia resides along with sebum at infandibulum of the hair follicle22,23. Hence possibly culture based technique is better than DNA based non-culture technique, as in the later only the surface of the skin is sampled without including hair infundibulum. Another disadvantage of DNA based non-culture technique is that the DNA from both viable and nonviable cells are amplified.