How Can the Laboratory Help Direct Appropriate Antimicrobial Therapy for Vaginitis?
The laboratory can influence the effective treatment of patients with vaginitis by providing a rapid direct microscopy result. In most cases, microscopic vaginal specimen results will be available within 24 hours of collection. By encouraging physicians to collect genital samples in adult women from the actual site of infection (i.e., cervix not vagina), and not culturing and reporting normal vaginal flora, the laboratory can not only enhance the diagnosis of sexually transmitted diseases such as N. gonorrhoeae, but also curtail unnecessary antibiotic use. 1. Nugent RP, Krohn MA, Hillier SL. Reliability of diagnosing bacterial vaginosis is improved by a standard method of Gram stain interpretation. J Clin Microbiol 29:297;1991.
