Immunological Reactions of Pneumonic Pleural Fluids

Pleuritic exudates from patients with lobar pneumonia may be sterile or infected. Sterile fluids, at or about the time of crisis, contain actively acquired antibodies similar to those in the blood serum. Infected fluids do not contain such antibodies, presumably because of the presence in them of large amounts of soluble specific substance. Sterile fluids from patients treated with immune sera have both horse serum and antibodies similar to those injected. Infected fluids from serum-treated cases contain horse serum and such heterologous antibodies as were contained in the therapeutic sera together with homologous soluble specific substance. The concentration of horse serum and antibodies in pneumonic fluids is usually the same or somewhat less than that of the corresponding blood sera.