MUCUS ON CONJUNCTIVA AND CORNEA

Mucus is universally known to be present in the conjunctival sac and in certain cases also on the anterior corneal surface. The mucus is produced by goblet cells. These are found scattered among the conjunctival epithelial cells and must be regarded as a modified form of the latter, whose nuclei have been pressed down to the lower part, while the rest of the cell is filled up by mucous or its precursor. The number of goblet cells is the largest in the fornices (WoZff 1948). Slit lamp examination is particularly useful for detection of mucus, but such can also be observed by ordinary inspection. Mucus is seen in keratoconjunctivitis sicca, for instance, where mucous filaments or lumps may be found across the cornea; further, by infectious conjunctivitis, where purulent mucous clots may be present in the inferior fornix. Kniisel in 1923, by double vital staining of the eye with scarlet red and Bismarck brown, observed mucous drops and filaments, which are supposed to have been swollen mucus expelled from the goblet cells. Such mucous products are up to several hundred p long. They are easily visible, freely movable, and situated on the bulbar conjunctiva at the limbus, on the caruncle and plica, and in pathological cases also on the cornea. The number varies, but is generally small. Mucus has often been recovered in scrapings from the conjunctiva, visible partly as well-defined, long bands containing innumerable cells and fibrinous filaments, and partly as more diffuse, weakly stained mucus. In preparations of conjunctival fluid alone, obtained by suction with a pipette, it has been shown that the mucus may be found dissolved in the fluid. The amount present varies with the clinical state (Norn 1960). The further fate of the mucus is unknown. Is the total amount dissolved in