Trichomonas vaginalis. I. Survival in solid Stuart's medium.

Stuart's medium was originally prepared for use as a transport medium for gonococci (Stuart, 1946; Stuart, Toshach, and Patsula, 1954), but has now gained wide employment as a suitable transport medium for many micro-organisms (Stuart, 1956; Cooper, 1957; Gastrin, Kallings and Marcetic, 1968) including Trichomonas vaginalis (Stuart, 1956; Whittington, 1957; Odegaard, 1962). The original Stuart's medium is a semi-solid, nonnutrient medium, which prevents oxidation and dessication of the micro-organisms transported. Since a solid medium is easier to handle, the original medium has been modified by increasing the agar concentration (Reyn, Korner, and Bentzon, 1960; Ringertz, 1960). This modification, together with charcoal-impregnated applicators (Moffett, Young, and Stuart, 1948), has been used since 1960 in this Department, for the transport of freshly-obtained material to be cultured for gonococci. Since 1962 the same equipment has been used for transport of T. vaginalis (Nielsen, 1965). Apart from the investigation by Odegaard (1962), no detailed information is available concerning the survival time of T. vaginalis in Stuart's medium. Since knowledge on this point is of importance for laboratories using the medium for transport purposes, this problem became the subject of the present investigation.