[Investigation of the prevalence of Trichomonas vaginalis in women with complaints of vaginal discharge and itching].

Trichomonas vaginalis (T. vaginalis) is the most common pathogen that is sexually spread in women. In this study, the presence of Trichomonas vaginalis was investigated in patients with vaginal discharge and itching who presented at the polyclinic of the Mustafa Kemal University Medical Faculty Department of Gynecology. These women were between 20-40 years of age. During gynecologic examination of patients, vaginal fluid samples were collected with swaps from the speculum and fornics to two tubes that contained sterile saline. One of the vaginal discharges collected with swaps was used for direct microscopic examination and Giemsa staining. The other one was used for culturing for T. vaginalis in Trichomonas medium that contained horse serum and antibiotics. While the fre-quency of T. vaginalis was found to be 1.81% (5 of the 275 samples) by the direct microscopic examination and Giemsa stain, this ratio was 2.18% (6 of the 275 samples) by the culture method. In conclusion, it was decided to use the culture method in diagnosis of T. vaginalis in addition to direct microscopic examination. This was the first study of T. vaginalis infection in our region and it was compared with other studies carried out in other regions of Turkey. Our results were somewhat lower than those in other regions.