Leucorrhoea (fluor genitalis)

Information

Leucorrhoea, together with the pain and bleeding, is one of the most often symptoms in gynecology. Approximately each third patient seeks doctor’s assistance due to leucorrhoea. There is no woman who at least once in her life to be disturbed by this symptom.

The wetness of female genitals to a certain extent is accepted as normal. The normal vaginal content is not discharged via vulva. It is white in colour and with pasty consistence. Intense discharge of secret is marked as fluorine. This discharge may be diluted, thick, foamy, whitish, yellowish, bloody, etc. Sometimes it is accompanied with the sense of irritation, itching or heaviness in pelvis.

Genital fluorine may be due to different basic lesions. Agents may be protozoa, mycosis, bacteria, viruses. Equilibrium of vaginal ecosystem is very delicate, labile and can be easily disturbed  by external and internal factors. Most frequent source of genital fluorine is vagina. The normal vaginal content is 1-2 g, it is semi-liquid, pasty. In inflammatory changes, the balance between transudation and resorption of the active component of vaginal content is disturbed, it increases and discharges outside, wets vulva and stains the clothes. Vagina possesses a unique natural biological protection mechanism, which hampers the penetration of infection into the upper parts of female genital tract. Physiologically this mechanism is reduced during menstruation. Some other factors may reduce it: insufficient closure of vulva (delivery traumas, descensus), bad hygiene, foreign bodies, frequent and inadequate vaginal washings, hormonal disturbances, antibiotic therapy, severe hormonal deficiency (menopause, operative extirpation of ovaries) and other factors.

Methods for examination of vaginal medium:

• 1. Bacterioscopic examination of vaginal cleanness – examination under microscope  of vaginal smear.
• 2. Cultural examination: inoculations on special nutrient media, which allow exact identification of causative microorganism. Increased whites may be due to reasons of some other etiology. In making the therapeutic plan, we have to take into consideration the fluorine topography and the cause for increased discharge, to isolate, if possible, microbiological agent. Only then the treatment shall be effective one.