Symptom Finder - Urethral Discharge
Urethral Discharge
In patients with gonorrhea, the discharge is purulent, but it is almost always clear with chlamydia and balanitis. The physician must massage
the prostate to diagnose the discharge in chronic prostatitis. Be sure to have the patient milk the penis down after the massage. Then one collects a drop or two of the discharge and examines it under a microscope for white blood cells. It should not be necessary to do this in cases of acute prostatitis (and indeed is ill-advised) because this can easily be diagnosed by the swollen boggy feel of the prostate. Do not forget that patients may mislead a clinician by calling a chancre or chancroid a “discharge.”
In patients with gonorrhea, the discharge is purulent, but it is almost always clear with chlamydia and balanitis. The physician must massage
the prostate to diagnose the discharge in chronic prostatitis. Be sure to have the patient milk the penis down after the massage. Then one collects a drop or two of the discharge and examines it under a microscope for white blood cells. It should not be necessary to do this in cases of acute prostatitis (and indeed is ill-advised) because this can easily be diagnosed by the swollen boggy feel of the prostate. Do not forget that patients may mislead a clinician by calling a chancre or chancroid a “discharge.”
