Streptococcus Group B

[G1da]

Hi,

I need some help!

I am soon to give birth to our first child and it turned out that I am carrying the Strep B/ Beta Strep bacteria.

I read about this topic a bit and I would need some advice from mums who were in similar situation.

Apparently only 0.5% of the babies get infected.
To avoid infection, the procedure is to give IV antibiotic to the mum during labour. I am concerned as it seems that following this treatment other bacteries (e.g. iE coli) in babies can develop resistance to antibiotics (super bugs). Also, the actibiotic administered also kills useful bacteria that serves to help digestion in the newborn.

My question: if you had this treatment, has your child suffered consequences on the long term?

Please share your experience!!!!

Thank you!

G

I have an 11 week old who was treated for this with 5 days of IV antibiotics. Probably too soon to know but the doctors aren't expecting any problems and she is feeding well and gaining weight. It did make me very determined to breastfeed. In the long run their guts will be colonised by plenty of other bacteria.

Hi,

Thank you for sharing your recent experience.
May I ask wether you received IV antibiotics during labour or not and your daughter fell ill some times after birth, unexpectadly?

I am pleased to hear that she is well and eating properly. Doesn't she have more tummy-aches than other uninfected/ untreated newborns?

In my case it wasn't strep B, they never did identify the infective agent. My waters broke early and I spiked a temperature so I had a single dose of IV antibiotics and was induced.

The doctors had made the decision to start her antibiotic treatment before she was born so it wasn't unexpected that she was ill. There was an awful moment when she stopped breathing and went blue but they brought her round with oxygen. She had to spend the night in NICU for OBS but actually perked up pretty quickly with antibiotic treatment.

It's hard for me to compare her to other newborns as she is my first. She is quite gassy and sometimes wakes writhing with gas but I don't think that's unusual in newborns.

My baby had antibiotics after birth as my waters broke but labour didn't start so he was on them for a precaution. I mixed optibac probiotic powder into his milk and BF as much as I could and he's a healthy, happy boy now 14 weeks old and thriving.

Best of luck for the birth and massive congrats!!

You can also get some formula's with added probiotics if you go the FF route.

I tested positive for group strep B after giving birth and my baby boy was on precautionary antibiotics for two days afterwards before his results came back negative. Having the canula in his little hand was fairly traumatic (for us) but he’s now a healthy, hearty 18 month old

My first baby had an early onset GBS infection - I didn’t test positive for it beforehand though so no option to have antibiotics. Having had one baby with a GBS infection puts you at greater risk of it happening again, so second time around I had antibiotics in labour and everything was fine, no side effects that I was aware of for either of us.

Lots of women are GBS carriers and most of the time there are no issues. Personally I don’t believe it’s necessary for all GBS+ women to get antibiotics during labour unless there are additional risk factors. These include:

• GBS detected in urine
• Prolonged time from waters breaking to giving birth**
• Previous baby with GBS infection
• Premature labour
• Elevated temperature during labour

So if you have any of those risk factors then you’d definitely want to have the antibiotics as that’s when babies are more likely to be affected.

You do always have the option of having antibiotics in labour because of having tested positive for GBS - I might very well have done that with my first baby if I’d known I was a carrier as it is the safest option. The antibiotics don’t have any nasty side effects it’s just a bit of a nuisance to have to have them. It is a personal decision, you don’t have to have them, but just bear in mind that they do substantially reduce the risk of the baby being infected, although as I said that risk isn’t particularly high in the first place.

Second child and I had no issues whatsoever as a result of having the antibiotics during labour. I took some probiotics into hospital with me and took them but not sure that was actually necessary, I just felt better for doing something proactive. First child had a full course of antibiotics obviously when he was poorly with it and also had no long-term digestive effects or increased susceptibility to illness or anything. They are both very healthy and for my first child (possibly second too) the antibiotics literally were a life saver.

Actually first baby did get a bit of infection around his umbilical cord when he was still in hospital and needed a different course of antibiotics for that - not sure if that was related to the antibiotics he was taking in the first place for the GBS but there was obviously no way to have avoided that.

** With my first baby it was something like 36 hours, so that may well have been why he became poorly with it.

A one off dose of antibiotics in labour won’t affect microbial resistance AFAIK, it certainly wasn’t something I was concerned about. And the gut flora issue - I’ve had a quick look and the most recent research paper I looked at did show an effect BUT that had largely disappeared when tested at 12 weeks.

Thank you all of you for the valuable insight. It does make my decision easier.

I am delighted to hear that no-one experienced any nasty side-effects in their baby after the antibiotic treatment.

I had IV antibiotics in labour, no issues here, I'm alergic to penicillin too so they used a different one.

If you breastfeed then your baby will be fine.
Mine had iv antibiotics for another reason shortly after birth - there were no side effects.
Strep b can kill your baby - don’t take the risk

I had antibiotics with two of my babies. Bit frustrating to have to be attached to drip, and the second labour was too fast so the ABs probably wouldn't have made it through to baby in time, but otherwise no ill affects. But they did want me to stay in hosp for 24hrs afterwards, rather than leaving after 6hrs, as I'd've preferred.

Not a massive deal, and definitely better than them getting the bug x

My grandson had antibiotics for 5 days Mum had a drip during labour, both fine he was breastfed for 8 months now 4 and always healthy,