Strep B in mother and babies

LegacyUser

I have Strep B and when in labour my baby got it, its life treating for babies, she nearly died, luckily she is doing great now,
my question is any other mothers out there that their baby got strep b........how are they doing......etc etc etc

Victor

I'm going to move this to the parenting forum.

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Moved from Personal Issues.

kelle

I'm sorry to hear what happened OP, but glad everything is fine now.
At 36 weeks, my waters broke with baby no.2 and she was born 18 hours later by Caesarean. 2 nights later, a doctor informed me samples had been taken from my baby's skin at birth and sent to the lab - they had found traces of Strep B. She was put on an antibiotic for 10 days, but never developed any sickness.
It is a bacteria that is easily killed by antibiotic, if it is caught in time.
My daughter willl be 6 before Christmas and is doing fine!
I don't advise reading that GBSS website, it tells you the worst case scenarios and may frighten the life out of you, as it did me!

hmr

Hi here,
Saw this post and had to reply - I had a similar experience to you. Baby was born and was a bit irritable but not taken to special care. He was given a number of doses of calpol as the irritability was put down to some cuts on his head from the delivery. He was being taken into the nursery by the nurses at night and on the third night he was found having a seizure. He had the full range of symptoms by this time though - high temp, vomitting, moaning, eyes rolling, floppy, fitting. He was confirmed as having b strep Meningitis and septicaemia. Infection levels from the spinal tap were very high. He was on 3 weeks of intravenous antibiotics in high dependency intensive care. We brought him home from the hospital not knowing what if any long-term effects there would be. He was too young to assess. We were told we just had to wait and see. It was a long and painful number of months of neurology tests, audiology tests, physiotherapy, etc etc We were under a number of teams in Crumlin hospital including Infectious diseases, neurology, audiology, ENT. Anyway, he has come through everything really well and is now 4 years old. My blood still runs cold when I think back to that awful first year and how close we came to a different outcome. I had never heard of B strep but while lots of women are carriers very few babies in Ireland get it. In america far more babies pick it up so they are far more vigilant as a result. Cold comfort to me but if you do pass it to one baby there is a significant risk of passing it to a subsequent baby so every precaution must be taken.

Dfens

As far as I know a lot of other countries routinely screen mothers for Group B streptococcus prior to delivery......but not routinely in Ireland it seems....:(

kelle

I was amazed my doctor seemed unconcerned about Strep B when I was attending him with my subsequent baby. I asked him to write it at the front of my notes. However, my waters did not break with baby no.3 and I had an elective Caesarean, so she wasn't affected.
HMR, I'm sorry to read about your little boy, and all you went through. But thank goodness he's OK now.

tallaght01

I'm always annoyed that A) we don't routinely screen for Group B streptococcus and How little knowledge people tend to have about it.

It's one of the most lethal infections a baby can get. When you see a case, you'll never forget it. About 20% of women carry it, but very few babies get it. But it's good to know of the mum is at risk.

Unfortunately, I've never worked ina country where we've routinely screened asymptomatic mothers for it.

I worked with a group a few years ago trying to make a vaccine for it, that could be given to teenage girls. We made good progress, and I hope that in years to come (perhaps many years though) there will be a vaccine for it.

miders

they screen for it in limerick regional maternity hospital.and treat with antibiotics in labour.

tallaght01

miders wrote: »

they screen for it in limerick regional maternity hospital.and treat with antibiotics in labour.

Do they do a high vaginal swab on EVERY mother coming in?

Fair play if they do. It's a sensible enough, but expensive step. Most places just swab if you have somehting that could be a sign of infection (eg discharge etc).

miders

no of course they dont vaginal swabs on every woman that would be invasive and unnessasary!
they do take a urine sample in the antenatal clinic...which can detect strep b.

tallaght01

miders wrote: »

no of course they dont vaginal swabs on every woman that would be invasive and unnessasary!
they do take a urine sample in the antenatal clinic...which can detect strep b.

The problem with this approach is that it only works in one direction, though......ie if you have group b strep in your urine, you're likely to be heavily colonised. BUT, you can be heavily colonised and not have group b strep in your urine.

CDC reccomendations are stil vaginal and rectal swabs if you're going to screen effectively. But it's interesting to hear what they're doing in Ireland.