Opportunistic coryneform organisms--residents of human skin.

Opportunistic infections are usually caused by endogenic flora originated from physiological flora. In this context we studied coryneform bacteria recovered from deeper layers of epidermis of the forehead (278 isolates) and the back (196 isolates) of healthy men. It was observed that coryneform bacteria are in dynamic equilibrium with coagulase-negative staphylococci and they amount 4,7% of resident aerobic flora. On the base of biological and metabolic features 49 different biotypes were indicated. Biotypes of lipophilic rods were the basic part of coryneform flora existing for long period. The most frequently isolated taxa were C. jeikeium (31%), CDC group G2 (23,4%), next in order CDC group G1 (11%) and C. afermentans ssp. lipophiluni (7%). These isolates were phenotypically differentiated. Nonlipophilic species did not play significant role in creating resident flora of the skin. The significance of coryneform bacteria in opportunistic infections is growing, especially in immunocompromissed patients. Isolated lipophilic taxa belong to these taxa coryneforms which are described in literature as the main etiologic factors of opportunistic infections.