Antibiotics During Childbirth May Be Risky to Baby

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Antibiotics given to mothers during labor and delivery increase the risk of late-onset bacterial infections in infants, investigators report.

Several studies have shown an association between maternal antibiotic therapy, often given to prevent group B strep infections, and early-onset of infection in preterm infants, the team explains in the medical journal Pediatrics, but the question of late effects of antibiotic treatment during childbirth has not been addressed.

Dr. Tiffany S. Glasgow and colleagues from the University of Utah, Salt Lake City, compared 90 infants who developed serious bacterial infections 7 to 90 days after being born, with 92 similar but unaffected "control" babies.

More infected infants than the controls had been exposed to antibiotics during birth (i.e., intrapartum) -- 41 percent versus 27 percent, respectively -- and infected infants were five times as likely as control infants to have been exposed to broad-spectrum antibiotics, the researchers found.

"Taking into account the potential limitations of our study, we believe that our findings have uncovered a potentially important, unintended consequence of the widespread use of broad-spectrum intrapartum antibiotics to prevent early-onset group B streptococcal infection," the investigators conclude.

The team was "somewhat surprised" to find that most mothers, 85 percent, accurately recalled whether they had been given antibiotics during delivery. "When an infant is being evaluated for a serious bacterial infection," Glasgow and colleagues advise, "maternal recollection of intrapartum antibiotics can be a valuable historical tool and may help guide initial antibiotic treatment."

SOURCE: Pediatrics, September 2005.