Group B strep: How did it affect your birth?

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I've just been told I've probably got group B strep - they need to do retests but I've heard a false positive test is very rare, so the likelihood is that I do.

So from what I understand, this means I will have to be on intravenous antibiotics throughout birth to avoid transmitting it to the baby.

Obviously if this is what needs to happen to keep the baby safe then so be it. But I'm really worried that it means I'll end up confined to a bed, unable to move around, use water, my ball or any of the things I know are likely to make a big difference to my physical and mental capacity to get through it.

If you have group B strep and have given birth before, can you tell me what that meant for what you could and couldn't do in labour?

OP you asked for peoples experiences on this, which they have given.

Previous posters have very kindly posted links for you and therefore you should research this and decide for yourself what you want to do.

Murphys, your post has given me the shivers. My daughter was a very sick baby, sounds so similar to your story, not eating, temperatures etc. She got very very ill and we almost lost her, now I am wondering if it was the group b strep all along. I was never tested in my last pregnancy at all. Your post is scary, I just hope I get the antibiotics this time.

I am in Ireland and there is definitely not routine tests for it here, I will pay privately to get it done after 35weeks.

To the op, I had searched for group b strep on mumsnet previously and there are some lovely posts about water births etc. They just wore a plastic glove over the drip, I think a lot depends on the midwife and of course yourself, so good luck with your research and your birth. Very best wishes.

I'm surprised by some of the replies. I've not tested positive for group b strep in any of my 3 pregnancies, but tested positive as a teenager. I was told you will ALWAYS have to have antibiotics in labour if you have EVER tested positive-whether it is active at that time or not. I have managed 2 very active labours, one a water birth, and one not so active but nothing to do with the drip! Good luck op.

They've changed that policy, Waitrose - at the beginning of my last pregnancy I was told I'd need antibiotics in labour, as I'd tested positive in my first pregnancy in 2012 (and had the antibiotics then).

But by my 36week appointment (3 months ago) they'd changed the policy. No further tests and no antibiotics in labour even if you'd been positive previously.

Hence I gave birth without the drip. Wouldn't have had time for it anyway, mind- DD was born around 15 mins after I hopped in the birthing pool!

Op, I could have written your post last year. When I found out I had it, I became convinced that labour would be something done TO me and that I wouldn't get a say.

I can honestly say that I had a wonderful and positive experience. DD did get stuck but that was totally unrelated to the GBS.

My consultant and antenatal clinic midwives couldn't give me consistent answers which made me more anxious so they arranged a session with a labour ward midwife to go through how my birth preferences compared to their protocols.

My baby was a nightmare on the monitor. She wriggled away from it so they could never get a good reading and I was scared of being stuck on the bed and strapped to a monitor. They suggested using a fetal scalp clip monitor instead, which was fab. I was up on my feet for almost the entire labour, I could only move around near the bed but that's all I wanted.

I was on IV antibiotics every four hours. The rest of the time, the drip was disconnected. I barely noticed but I was also on the drip for induction anyway. If I wanted to move, I just wheeled the drip stand round too. I am really squeamish about the cannulas. Silly but I can't bear even looking at them in others. they bandaged it up for me so I couldn't see it and didn't need to worry about knocking it etc.

I showed should GBS of infection during and after labour, so they automatically started treating both of us for GBS immediately. It meant we had to stay in for an extra 2 days until the results showed we didn't have it. Not ideal, but in my case it meant i was still there when they realised I desperately needed a blood transfusion on day 3.

The only negative was that my poor tiny baby had to be taken away for IV antibiotics every 12 hours, through a cannula. On the first night, she wriggled it out of her arm and it was resited in her foot - it was just horrible. I'm hugely grateful that she didn't have the infection and would do ANYTHING to avoid a future baby having to go through that.

Good luck, I hope you get some answers and clarity soon.

Hi OP

I had a GBS diagnosis from a cervical smear in my last pregnancy. I worried a lot about it but it was all fine. I was still able to labour on the MLU, use the birth pool etc (well, until they burst my waters and there was meconium which meant going to he consultant-led unit, but that wasn't GBS related).

I had a cannula inserted and IV ABs every 4 hrs. Apart from the discomfort of the cannula, I have no memory of the ABs at all.

My birth was long and ended in ventouse, and DD was grunting a little on delivery, and was thoroughly checked over by a team. However, her breathing cleared quickly and she had no ill effects, and nor did I.

I have been advised to take the ABs again this time around, and I see no sensible reason not to, it was no hassle. In my experience, the medical teams were pretty vigilant to the GBS flag but not to an extent that was detrimental to my care - exactly as I would hope it would be managed.

Hi OP,

Dd is 8 now, I was gbs positive, had antibiotics in labour but still able to walk around in between etc. was in the active birthing unit but labour didnt progress. I had to have my waters broken manually and eventually needed a caesarean. When dd was born she appeared to be a normal healthy baby but after 24 hours she still seemed sleepy, not feeding properly etc, thankfully an alert midwife had suspicions that something was very wrong, she was whisked off for a lumbar puncture and a chest x-ray. It turned out that despite the antibiotics and not giving birth vaginally that dd was infected with pneumonia thanks to gbs. We had to stay in hospital for 10 days while she was given intravenous antibiotics.

I guess my point is that knowledge is a good thing, knowing you have gbs means you can get antibiotics and there will be extra monitoring for you and your wee one, it was the note about gbs on dd's file that alerted our midwife. As previous posters have said, a baby's birth is just a few hours, gbs at its worst can have catastrophic consequences.

Really hope your birth goes well and you have the experience you're hoping for. I don't think a gbs diagnosis should stop you having an active birth.

Thanks running that's good news for me as we are hoping to try for #4 soon! So they just do a test to see if it is active or not at all?

No test at all, waitrose - I asked two different midwives, and they said they don't test in pregnancy now, even if you've been GBS positive in the past.
I was happy with that as didn't particularly want the antibiotics in labour, and I know how unreliable the test can be anyway.

Like i said upthread though, I could never have had the drip in any case as my labour was too quick. I staggered onto the ward ready to push, and the pool was filled just in time for DD to pop out.

I was too quick with #2 so they just kept us in for 24 hours to observe. Number 3 it seemed better thought out so they put the drip in for a short amount of time then took it out and gave 1 more round a few hours later. Hopefully number 4 will be like number 2! Thank you that is really good to know.

I'm currently pregnant with my second. With my first I had a urine infection (like most women during pregnancy I know!), I read that they can be caused by Strep B so to be safe I got checked and mine was caused by Strep B. I've been told since by someone that it's rare to have a UTI caused by Strep B but I've had 2 friends with exactly the same thing so it can't be that rare. I read loads of scary stuff on google and freaked myself out but in reality it is EXTREMELY rare for a baby to develop complications from Strep B. My waters broke well before I got to the hospital so I was told there was no point in giving me antibiotics during labour as baby could have been exposed already so I and baby would have to stay in for intravenous antibiotics and observation for 7-10 days after birth. It was horrible being in the hospital but at least I knew my but was safe and we had time to bond. Although you always get the antibiotics no matter what, the chances of anything happening to the baby even if we hadn't are extremely rare, they usually fight the infection off themselves and they think a lot of women give birth and pass it on without even knowing. There are much worse things to have so don't fret about it at all just have the antibiotics and you'll be fine. I had an epidural with my first anyway so confinement to the bed wasn't on my worry list!