Aberrant bacterial forms from various ocular sites.

Patients may harbor cell-wall-deficient organisms or other aberrant bacterial forms (ABFs) in their eyes. In this survey of 400 cultures, we found the incidence of ABFs isolated from various ocular sites to be 13.2%. The rate of isolation of these forms from the eyes of patients with suspected bacterial infection differed greatly from that for noninfected eyes. We will describe the microbiological techniques employed and will present our analysis of the data obtained.