Pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) from the perspective of African practitioners is reviewed: diagnosis, staging and treatment. PID is the most common disorder treated in the gynecological department, and is a major public health problem because of the large number of patients, prolonged hospital stays, high mortality rate, and serious late sequelae of chronic pain, infertility and ectopic pregnancy. Diagnosis is difficult without confirmation by laparoscopy. PID is probable in complaints of acute abdominal pain, arising just after menses, with cervical excitation tenderness upon vaginal examination. The most reliable laboratory finding is accelerated sedimentation rate. State I is acute PID without peritoneal irritation; Stage II involves peritonitis and bilateral lower quadrant rebound tenderness; State III is a mass or abscess; Stage IV is rupture of the tubo-ovarian abscess. Culdocentesis producing gross pus suggests polymicrobial infection. The goals of treatment are to cure the patient and reach all of her partners, and to prevent late sequelae. Stage I patients can be treated with oral antibiotics as outpatients. Stage II can be effectively treated with penicillin and chloramphenicol in 80

作者：X, De Muylder

来源：Tropical doctor 1988 年 18卷 2期