Direct and delayed methods of immunofluorescent diagnosis of gonorrhoea in women.

Deacon and his colleagues were the first to demon- strate Neisseria gonorrhoeae by the immunofluorescent or fluorescent antibody (FA) technique (Deacon, Peacock, Freeman, and Harris, 1959; Deacon, Pea- cock, Freeman, Harris, and Bunch, 1960). They re- ported a direct method for FA staining of smears of patients' secretions, and a delayed method in which patients' specimens were cultured and smears for FA staining were taken from the culture plates after incubation. They reported that the direct method gave fewer positive results than the delayed method which gave the same yield as routine cultures.