THE PRESENT STATUS OF MYCETOMA

The term mycetoma is used at the present time to include maduromycosis and actinomycosis. In 1846, before the causes of these chronic inflammatory conditions were known, Colebrook¹ first recorded in the literature the geographico-anatomic name, Madura foot. Carter,² in his monograph published in 1874, designated them on the basis of etiology and pathology by the term mycetoma (meaning fungus tumor). The term maduromycosis was introduced in 1916 by Chalmers and Archibald³ to apply to an etiologic subgroup of mycetoma, which they distinguish from actinomycosis. Actinomycosis, as caused by Actinomyces bovis, has been known since the work of Bollinger in 1878, and as many of the organisms isolated from cases of Madura foot or mycetoma of the foot have been found to belong to the genus Actinomyces, actinomycosis likewise has become a subgroup of the mycetomas. Although progress has been made during the last decade in respect to