Rapid diagnosis of chlamydial conjunctivitis in laboratory.

PURPOSE: To evaluate the techniques of rapid and accurate diagnosis of chlamydial conjunctivitis. METHODS: Total 100 conjunctivitis patients (200 eyes) were studied. Twenty-two of 100 cases were diagnosed as chlamydial conjunctivitis. The infected epithelia were scraped from tarsal conjunctiva of both eyes and stained separately with Giemsa (100 cases) and immunofluorescence (anti-chlamydial antigen monoclonal antibody, 100 cases). RESULT: In immunofluorescent staining, 38 cases were seen positive staining and 62 were negative. In Giemsa staining, 29 were positive, and 71 were negative. In 22 cases with clinical diagnosis of chlamydial conjunctivitis, 13 cases were confirmed, and 9 were excluded by immunofluorescent staining. Technically, immunofluorescent and Giemsa stain takes 45 and 40 minutes, respectively. CONCLUSION: Comparing to Giemsa stain, 38 of 100 scraping specimens were positive (38%) by immunofluorescent staining, 29 of 100 per cent were positive by Giemsa staining. Giemsa staining takes 5 minutes less than immunofluorescent staining (40 versus 45 minutes), however, the positive staining in immunofluorescent staining is much easier to be recognized than Giemsa staining.