A NEW TRACHOMA CONCEPT

Abstract

INTRODUCTION TRACHOMA is a mild, insidious disease, frequently self-limiting, not especially infectious, comparatively harmless, the causative organism of which we accept today as a filterable virus, not yet isolated, but believed to be specific for conjunctival and corneal epithelium. There are only two types of trachoma. The first is true, simple trachoma, as defined by the preceding statement. The second is infected trachoma, the result of an addition to the trachoma virus of one or a variety of secondary organisms. These two types are distinctly different one from the other in every pathological and clinical aspect. The failure to differentiate these two types, or the indifference toward their recognition, resulted in the mass of confusion in the literature on trachoma of the past 100 years. Writers have not yet come to an agreement on what they are talking about when they say trachoma. It is the purpose of this article