Recovery of microorganisms from the pelvic cavity after intracervical or intrauterine artificial insemination.
To assess the risk of introducing microorganisms into the peritoneal cavity during intracervical or intrauterine insemination, we cultured the cervix and semen from 19 couples before insemination and the peritoneal fluid from the female partner after insemination. The peritoneal cultures taken before hydrotubation grew organisms in one of ten intracervical inseminations and five of the nine intrauterine inseminations (P less than 0.05). In four of the five positive peritoneal cultures from the intrauterine group, the organism was also cultured from the semen specimen obtained before insemination and not from the cervical sample. Therefore, intrauterine insemination appears to increase the risk of introducing microorganisms into the upper genital tract and the peritoneal cavity. The clinical significance of this finding remains to be established.
D000328:Adult; D001420:Bacteria, Aerobic / Q000302:isolation & purification; D001421:Bacteria, Anaerobic / Q000302:isolation & purification; D002584:Cervix Uteri / Q000382:microbiology; D002689:Chlamydia / Q000302:isolation & purification; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007315:Insemination, Artificial / Q000009:adverse effects*; D007317:Insemination, Artificial, Homologous / Q000009:adverse effects* / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D009174:Mycoplasma / Q000302:isolation & purification; D010529:Peritoneal Cavity / Q000382:microbiology*; D011897:Random Allocation; D012661:Semen / Q000382:microbiology*; D014599:Uterus; D014780:Viruses / Q000302:isolation & purification