This is strictly restricted to those conditions when the normal vaginal secretion is increased in amount.

In such patients there will be no excess of leucocytes present when the discharge is examined under the microscope, and the discharge is macroscopically and microscopically non-purulent.

Purulent discharges due to specific infection such as gonorrhea, trichomoniasis and moniliasis, ulcerated growths of the cervix and he vagina, and discharges caused by urinary fistulae are of a different type and should be excluded from the term leucorrhoea. Some clinicians use the term to describe any white or yellowish-white discharge from the vagina.

An increase in the normal vaginal secretion develops physiologically at puberty, during pregnancy, at ovulation, and, in some women, during the premenstrual phase of the menstrual cycle.

During pregnancy the normal discharge is increased in amount because of the vascularity of the female genital tract.

During the latter part of menstrual cycle, the hypertrophied premenstrual glands of the endometrium secrete mucus which is discharged through the cervix into the vagina. The leucorrhoea of puberty is probably caused by the increased vascularity of the uterus, cervix, and vagina at that time. It is of temporary duration and needs no treatment.