VAGINAL FLORA IN CHILDREN

During recent years, some observations respecting vaginal infections in children attending the Vanderbilt Clinic suggested that there was a decreasing incidence of the gonococcus as an etiologic agent. A number of recorded studies in other localities supported this belief. Some investigators, however, have expressed the belief that the gonococcus is still the usual cause of vaginal discharge.¹ Therefore the present study was designed to determine what agent, or agents, is responsible for the production of this symptom in girls and at the same time to investigate the possible relation of vaginal discharge and the occurrence of infections of the upper respiratory tract. It also seemed desirable to obtain some information concerning the bacterial inhabitants of the healthy vaginal tract. This report consists, then, for the most part, in a record of data on smears and cultures and the clinical status for 16 premature infants studied in the nursery of