IO4 CLINICAL BACTERIOLOGY AND H^EMATOLOGY 



the most careful precautions as to asepsis, and forwarded 

 at once. Even if this is done the chance of getting cultures 

 is but slight, as the organism rarely survives if it has been 

 cooled down to the room temperature for a short time. It is 

 highly desirable to make the cultures direct on to medium 

 which has been previously warmed to the body temperature, 

 to incubate at once, and never to let them cool down. 



METHOD OF MAKING THE FILMS. 



The pus is to be spread out into thin films at the time at 

 which it is taken, and this is true whether the practitioner 

 intends to make the examination for himself or is about to 

 send the material to a bacteriologist. Gonorrhoeal pus should 

 never be collected on a piece of cotton-wool or enclosed in 

 vaccine tubes. 



The films are to be made thus : Take two clean slides and 

 place two or three platinum loopfuls of the pus on the centre 

 of one of them; sterilize the needle and lay it down. Now 

 take the other slide and apply its centre to the pus, and allow 

 it to fall on to the first slide by its own weight ; do not squeeze 

 the slides together, except in the case of viscid cervical mucus, 

 where it may be necessary. Then slide them apart, keeping 

 each in its own plane until they are entirely separated. This 

 will give you two excellent films. Allow them to dry and fix 

 them in the flame. 



The films may also be made on cover-glasses, exactly the 

 same process being adopted as in the preparation of blood- 

 films (see p. 256), except that it will be necessary to squeeze 

 the two lightly together. The fixation is accomplished by 

 passing the cover-glasses rapidly through the flame. 



These are the methods by which films are spread in all 

 cases; the way in which the pus should be obtained varies 

 somewhat with the nature of the case. 



In the male it is advisable to cleanse the meatus and to 

 reject the first drop of pus, taking the second with a platinum 

 loop and proceeding as before. Antiseptic precautions are 

 entirely unnecessary, unless an attempt is to be made to get 

 cultures. If the patient is suffering from phimosis, and there 

 is a purulent discharge, which may be due to gonorrhoea, 

 chancre, soft sore, or to a non-specific balanitis, a similar 



