Friday, June 26, 2009

Group B Streptococcus the confusing and nasty bug

Group B Streptococcus is a concern for women during childbirth and for those who care for them. The issues surrounding Group B Streptococcus are complex and the outcome of serious infection in the newborn is severe and sometimes fatal. It is a difficult issue to discuss with women during pregnancy and women need to be informed so that they can make an informed decision about screening for Group B Strep and the possible use of prophylactic antibiotics. Some years ago I developed a pamphlet for my own practice to help me to inform women about this issue. Other local midwives have found this pamphlet useful and I have recently updated the pamphlet to meet new local guidelines. I want to make this available to anyone who might find it useful and loaded it as a PDF onto Google Docs. Google docs will only allow access to PDF files to those who have a Google docs account and have been invited to view. I have now uploaded it onto SCRIBD and hoping this works
GBS Pamphlet 30th June 2009

9 comments:

Carolyn said...

I have had some scares with GBS and babies myself. I know how awful it is for everyone when a baby dies because of this infection, it is a tragedy. I have cared for women who have had GBS identified on swab culture and have refused antibiotics and the baby has been fine. I remember one 17 year old who had a clear swab, no GBS, an uneventful labour however her baby became unwell and GBS was diagnosed, the baby recovered fully after being in NICU and having antibiotics. I have also know of a woman having an anaphylactic reaction to prophylactic antibiotics. Not a great outcome then either. I think the only thing we can do, is be alert give the best information we can. I think we need to support women in the choices they make and inform them if the situation appears to have changed and they should reconsider their decision.

Anonymous said...

Carolyn I have tried and tried to print off this leaflet and it will not conform to A4. I am thrilled that I can get your uptodate version so "easily" if I could only print it out.

Coralie

Carolyn said...

Hi Coralie, Have you tried using the 'download' option and saving it as an adobe file on your computer. You should then be able to print it off. Let me know if this works for you.

Carolyn said...

Forgot to say you need to go to the document on the scribd site, then choose the download option.
Carolyn

A said...

Fantastic! Thank you so much for sharing this. I have already given this out to 2 women! This pamphlet highlights all the important information for women without pressuring them to chose one way or the other. And I love that you have included references so women can use this pamphlet as a starting point to educate themselves on GBS.

When I was a labour and delivery nurse in the US, where women are routinely screened for GBS and treated prophylactically in labour (they had a choice, but often the way the information was presented it didn't feel like a choice), I gave women multiple doses of antibiotics during long labours and while I have, thankfully, never seen a serious reaction, I always worried about it. I also have serious concerns about the effect this will have on antibiotic resistance in the future, as you noted.

Of course, I do not want any one I care for have a baby fall ill and/or die from GBS. The few babies I have cared for with streptococcal disease have all been born to GBS negative mothers and had low risk births.

This is truly a decision only the parents can make and I am so thankful for you to sharing this! Please feel free to share all your other pamphlets!

Carolyn said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Carolyn said...

Thanks for you comments A. I am glad that you are finding this useful. Just one wee thing. I thought I had rev\moved a comment form my pamphlet about the very high doses of antibiotics. The old obstetric guidelines locally were very high doses but this is not the case now. I have changed the pamphlet and removed this statement, it is otherwise the same. I have left both of these versions on Scribd and explained this difference. I am pretty sure I have the pamphlet right now. The beauty of this though is that I can update it so easily. I know that NZCOM are about to review their concesnsus statement on GBS so if there are any changes that come out of that I can make changes to the pamphlet and make the new one available.
I do not have any other pamphlets that I think would be useful. I used to have one on third stage but not sure it would be so good to share. I wonder if anyone else has pamphlets they would like to share. Maybe we could load them onto Scribd and post a comment on the discussion forum of The Midwifery Junction
to let others know about them. What do you think?

levitra cialis said...

yeah right, this is one of the most concer health issue, and not of for the mother, also for us as fathers, we have to keep a eye open, to any sign of this terrible disease, take the right cares and treatment, to avoid any kind of damage to the baby.

pay per head said...

thx you for your posts!!

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