Bacillis...Clostridium...Clostridioides
Nearly 100 years ago, a new bacteria was named for its fastidious nature. Although the genus has undergone iterative modification, the species remains a mark of these initial observations.
In a 1935 article published in the American Journal of Diseases of Children, Ivan Poole and Elizabeth O’Toole presented their discovery of a new anaerobic bacteria.
Poole and O’Toole explain their choice of name in the following way: “We have carefully searched the literature for a previous description of this second anaerobe, but so far without success; it is therefore named Bacillus difficilis because of the unusual difficulty which was encountered in its isolation and study.”
In the subsequent decades, the genus has been modified several times. First, André Prévot renamed it Clostridium difficile. Then, in 2016, it was officially renamed Clostridioides difficile.
But throughout difficile has remained, a reminder of the initial observations made by Hall and O’Toole.
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