What?
- Bacteria or viruses. The most common of these are staphylococcus however if the skin is not punctured then the body and the oils that the body produces can often be more than enough to take care of and to kill these types of bacteria. If they get inside of the body it can lead to a long list of symptoms many similar to the flu, food poisoning or even worse. Best way to avoid to get these into your body is to not bite your nails and always wash your hand before eating something.
- Fungi. This is also something we typically we want to avoid, the most classical example would be athletes foot which is a problem for many people that preform some kind of exercise, one of the highest risk of infection is a teenager who is active in the American football team, if the teenager has caught the fungi it needs to be treated with over the counter ointment because if not taken care of it will create irritation around the toes, dryness, cracking of the skin, give off an unpleasant smell and finally have the risk of spreading to other members of the teenagers American football team.
Where?
The body is big and complex and not all parts of it has the same microbiome, for example around the more sweaty parts of the body you are more likely to encounter the family of corynebacteriam these are considered normal part of the human body flora, and does not under normal conditions pose a threat to the health of the individual. But if you combine the sweat from the body with a place where there is not much oils from the body to kill them off, they can grow and become a problem.
A place like this does not normally exist where there is sweat there tends to be oil, but for people with prosthetics they can grow and become a real problem. To find the exact bacterias, that are part of your sin microbiome, you could perform 16S sequencing of your skin, in order to see the exact number and types of bacteria you have on you skin. You can read more here about 16s microbiome analysis and Biostatistical Analysis.
On the head and neck there is another type of microbiome where the sebaceous glands secret oils making it an ideal place for some of these organisms, if you also for example during training get very hot around these areas the growth of these bacteria is even faster. A good way to stop some of this growth is to make sure to stay cool when training. It should however be noted that most of the time the growth of these organism is not a big issue – it only becomes a issue with some people that should then discuss how to combat this in a good way with a medical professional.
Conclusion
Many times the microscopic life on our body is not harmful and in some circumstances even helpful and beneficial to our health, but sometimes it is actually harmful and needs to be given the proper attention in order to not cause great harm, I hope this article was an interesting read and a good starting point in order to think about your body and its current health status. And as always contact your medial professional before making any decisions regarding your health.