Studies of Gastrointestinal Flora in various Surgical Diseases Part I Flora in Cases without Administration of Antibiotics

Abstract

Studies of gastrointestinal flora in various surgical diseases are interesting and necessary for the prevention and treatment of postoperative infections.
Although stool specimens have so far been used for this type of study, I used contents of the stomach, the duodenum, the jejunum, the ileum and the transverse colon aspirated by direct needle punctures incidentally performed in 65 laparotomies.
The number of gram-negative bacilli becomes less and less as the gastrointestinal tracts are traced upward in chronic gastritis and gastroduodenal ulcer while more gram-positive cocci were found in the upper portion of the gastrointestinal tracts in chronic gastritis, gastroduodenal ulcer and gastric cancer. In gastric cancer and cholecystopathia, considerable number of gram-negative bacilli were also found in the upper portion.
Difference of diseases do not affect the distribution of gram-negative cocci, grampositive bacilli and yeasts.
The distribution of flora in various diseases is not merely related to the degree of the acidity of the gastric contents.
Susceptibility to antibiotics of isolated strains was tested in behalf of the prevention and the treatments of postoperative infections.