Urogenital System Infections

Two panels. At left, a photo of a clear plastic specimen container with a white screw-on lid, partly filled with yellow urine, standing on a dark surface. At right, a photo of a round culture plate on pale agar, with a cluster of dark blue-black colonies across the upper portion of the plate and pink-to-magenta colonies speckled with dark spots across the lower portion. — Many pathogens that cause infections of the urogenital system can be detected in urine samples (left). The top sample in the culture (right) was prepared from the urine of a patient with a urinary tract infection. (credit b: modification of work by Nathan Reading)

The urogenital system is a combination of the urinary tract and reproductive system. Because both systems are open to the external environment, they are prone to infections. Some infections are introduced from outside, whereas others result from imbalances in the microbiota of the urogenital tract.

Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are one the most common bacterial infections worldwide, affecting over 100 million people each year. During 2007 in the United States, doctor office visits for UTIs exceeded 10 million, and an additional 2–3 million emergency department visits were attributed to UTIs. Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) also primarily affect the urogenital system and are an important cause of patient morbidity. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that there are approximately 20 million new cases of reportable STIs annually in the United States, half of which occur in people aged 15–24 years old. When STIs spread to the reproductive organs, they can be associated with severe morbidity and loss of fertility.

Because males and females have different urogenital anatomy, urogenital infections may affect males and females differently. In this chapter, we will discuss the various microbes that cause urogenital disease and the factors that contribute to their pathogenicity.

Sections

Anatomy and Normal Microbiota of the Urogenital Tract — the major anatomical features of the urinary tract and the reproductive system in males and females, the normal microbiota of the urogenital system, and the general signs, symptoms, causes, and modes of transmission of urogenital infections.
Bacterial Infections of the Urinary System — cystitis, including cystitis in the elderly, kidney infections (pyelonephritis and glomerulonephritis), leptospirosis, and nongonococcal urethritis (NGU).
Bacterial Infections of the Reproductive System — bacterial vaginitis and vaginosis, gonorrhea, chlamydia, syphilis and congenital syphilis, and chancroid.
Viral Infections of the Reproductive System — genital herpes caused by herpes simplex virus, neonatal herpes, and human papillomavirus infections, including genital warts and the oncogenic HPV types associated with cervical cancer.
Fungal Infections of the Reproductive System — vaginal candidiasis, the yeast infection caused by Candida species, most often Candida albicans.
Protozoan Infections of the Urogenital System — trichomoniasis, the sexually transmitted infection caused by the flagellated protozoan Trichomonas vaginalis.

This chapter is adapted from Microbiology, Chapter 23: Urogenital System Infections by Nina Parker, Mark Schneegurt, Anh-Hue Thi Tu, Philip Lister, Brian M. Forster, and OpenStax, © OpenStax, licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. Access the original for free at openstax.org. Each section page records its own changes from the source. Changes: the chapter-opening figure is the source’s two-panel photo of a urine sample and a urine culture plate, re-encoded for the web, with its alt text rewritten to describe what is actually visible; the module marks “Urinary tract infections” as a term (class no-emphasis, so the source itself gives it no visual styling), which is rendered here as plain prose; the module has no footnote.

Respiratory Mycoses Anatomy and Normal Microbiota of the Urogenital Tract