A study of the skin flora of spinal cord injured patients

The skin flora of 11 spinally-injured patients was compared to that of 11 healthy control subjects. The perinea, groins, penile shafts and urethras of the patients were heavily colonized by a range of multi-drug resistant Gram-negative bacilli. Observations on patients from admission for up to 25 days suggest that the Gram-negative bacilli start to colonize the skin 2-3 days after admission. Some species, e.g., Citrobacter diversus and Escherichia coli appear as transient organisms while others such as Enterobacter aerogenes, Serratia marcescens, and Klebsiella pneumoniae seem to become stable skin residents. The relationship of the skin flora to the organisms causing urinary tract infections in these patients was studied.