Birthing Baths Can Cause Infections in Baby
Birthing Baths Can Cause Infections in Baby
Aug. 1, 2001 -- Warm baths are often given in hospitals to women in labor to help them relax and to speed up the birthing process. The technique is widely practiced but is not entirely free of risk, according to a group of German researchers that recently reported a case of a baby infected with a potentially life-threatening bug transmitted through a birthing bath.
According to one author of the report, Gerd Döring, PhD, from the Institut für Allgemeine Hygiene und Umwelthygiene at the Universität Tübingen, the bug that caused the problem, a type of bacteria called Pseudomonas aeruginosa, causes about 10% of the infections that are picked up by patients in hospitals.
"Relaxation bathtubs in hospitals, used by the vast majority of delivering women, may be contaminated by Pseudomonas aeruginosa," he says. The bug "may cause serious disease in newborns. Although such infections have been seldom observed previously, the route of transmission from the contaminated relaxation bathtub to the newborn via the mother was proven here."
"The major importance or significance of these findings relates to the ability of exposure to water, even in apparent 'high hygiene' conditions, to occasionally be the source of an infection," expert Gerald B. Pier, PhD, tells WebMD. The report also emphasizes how vulnerable newborns are to infection when they're exposed to such bugs during the birthing procedure, he says. Pier is a professor in the department of medicine at Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital.
In the letter -- published in the August 2 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine -- Döring and his colleagues write about the case of a 23-year-old woman who used a birthing bath for a half hour while in labor. She did not deliver the baby in the bath.
Eleven days after her infant son was born, the woman returned to the hospital because he was eating poorly, overly drowsy, and having seizures. It turns out the baby had meningitis, or an infection of the membranes lining the brain, caused by the Pseudomonas aeruginosa bug.
The infant was treated for six months with antibiotics and by surgically draining the fluid that had built up around his brain. The same infectious agent was found in the shower tubing used to clean the birthing bath and in the cream used at home on the baby's skin.
"The main [goal] of the letter is to alert hospital staff to check all bathtubs used by delivering women for Pseudomonas, and to caution women [about delivering] in bathtubs, since these bathtubs may be contaminated," says Döring. "Although the risk is low, it may happen again."
Birthing Baths Can Cause Infections in Baby
Aug. 1, 2001 -- Warm baths are often given in hospitals to women in labor to help them relax and to speed up the birthing process. The technique is widely practiced but is not entirely free of risk, according to a group of German researchers that recently reported a case of a baby infected with a potentially life-threatening bug transmitted through a birthing bath.
According to one author of the report, Gerd Döring, PhD, from the Institut für Allgemeine Hygiene und Umwelthygiene at the Universität Tübingen, the bug that caused the problem, a type of bacteria called Pseudomonas aeruginosa, causes about 10% of the infections that are picked up by patients in hospitals.
"Relaxation bathtubs in hospitals, used by the vast majority of delivering women, may be contaminated by Pseudomonas aeruginosa," he says. The bug "may cause serious disease in newborns. Although such infections have been seldom observed previously, the route of transmission from the contaminated relaxation bathtub to the newborn via the mother was proven here."
"The major importance or significance of these findings relates to the ability of exposure to water, even in apparent 'high hygiene' conditions, to occasionally be the source of an infection," expert Gerald B. Pier, PhD, tells WebMD. The report also emphasizes how vulnerable newborns are to infection when they're exposed to such bugs during the birthing procedure, he says. Pier is a professor in the department of medicine at Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital.
In the letter -- published in the August 2 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine -- Döring and his colleagues write about the case of a 23-year-old woman who used a birthing bath for a half hour while in labor. She did not deliver the baby in the bath.
Eleven days after her infant son was born, the woman returned to the hospital because he was eating poorly, overly drowsy, and having seizures. It turns out the baby had meningitis, or an infection of the membranes lining the brain, caused by the Pseudomonas aeruginosa bug.
The infant was treated for six months with antibiotics and by surgically draining the fluid that had built up around his brain. The same infectious agent was found in the shower tubing used to clean the birthing bath and in the cream used at home on the baby's skin.
"The main [goal] of the letter is to alert hospital staff to check all bathtubs used by delivering women for Pseudomonas, and to caution women [about delivering] in bathtubs, since these bathtubs may be contaminated," says Döring. "Although the risk is low, it may happen again."
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