Streptococcal Pseudomembranous Conjunctivitis: Report of a Case

Abstract

The etiologic agent in a case of streptococcal pseudomembranous conjunctivitis which occurred in a girl 6 years old was investigated over a period of 30 months. In the left eye, an extensive involvement of the cornea did not respond to ordinary treatment and after a few months the eye was enucleated. Later the right eye was attacked and there also developed a pseudomembranous vaginitis and acute glomerular nephritis. Various organisms were isolated from the bacterial flora of vagina and conjunctiva, but Streptococcus haemolyticus alone reproduced the symptoms in laboratory animals. At each exacerbation of the disease this organism appeared in cultures, then disappeared after a short time, although the pseudomembranes continued to form, leading to the conviction that the organism persisted dormant subconjunctivally. Lesions of the right eye and vagina responded favorably to treatment with scarlet-fever streptococcal antitoxin and apparently healed after immunization with scarlet-fever toxin and autogenous vaccine, although a granuloma persisted in the left socket over the entire period of 30 months. Extensive studies into the nature of the organism were made as well as pathologic investigations of sections of the pseudomembranes and the enucleated eye. From the Department of Ophthalmology, College of Medicine, State University of Iowa. Read before the Association for Research in Ophthalmology, Atlantic City, June 11, 1935.