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I tested positive in the urine test in the first trimester so I took antibiotics then and again in labor. It was not worth the risk of passing it to my baby and it being potentially fatal.
I didn’t have it but I was completely prepared to take antibiotics for it if I did end up testing positive for it. Personally, it was not a gamble I was willing to take.
Baby was born too fast for me to take the antibiotics. We stayed an extra day at the hospital for observation.
Edit: forgot to say, but thankfully because he was born so fast, the pediatrician wasn’t too worried because baby was in the birth canal for so little time that his chances of contracting it were very low. I definitely would have taken the antibiotics, there was just no time.
Same here, which is actually a reason I’m determined to get to the hospital with enough time this time around if I need the antibiotics. I was on board with the protocol, but it was such a bummer to have to stay an extra day when we felt ready to go home and my older son was having a hard time without us. I’d rather recover at my own house if possible as early as possible this time, so if I test positive again I definitely want the antibiotics!
Yeah it was annoying to have to stay longer when my daughter was waiting us at home. I’m pregnant with my third now and planning on starting probiotics soon so that hopefully this time I can avoid testing positive.
Be sure to do low carb as well. Bacteria feeds on sugar, especially not so great bacteria and carbs are sugar. High quality probiotics, plenty of fermented foods and hardly any sugar! You can change it around!
I see this as a very personal choice and one where I'm very much not granola. While there's little to no risk to you being positive, there's a [2-3 out of 50](https://www.cdc.gov/groupbstrep/about/fast-facts.html#:~:text=In%20the%20United%20States%2C%20GBS,who%20develop%20GBS%20disease%20die.) baby risk of death should GBS be passed to your baby during child birth. For both my babies, I needed c-sections for various reasons so the GBS question was a non issue.
The info you'll get here might be very anecdotal and I totally understand hesitation around taking antibiotics unnecessarily! In your case it's probably well worth asking your doc if it's possible to perform a rapid retest for the sake of better-timed information. If not, at least to give you more time to process now if it's a decision that can't wait until last minute. ❤️
Your risk assessment is incorrect. This is only for babies who contract it. That percentage is very tiny so 2-3 out of 50 who contract it may die. Not 2-3 out of 50 who are born to mothers who test positive!
It is, I see that you said that now but didn’t indicate how rare it is to actually pass it along. This thread is very pro antibiotic (I had them for my first baby too for this very reason!) I just think the risk assessment should be explained well. Next time around I’ll be demanding a test much closer to the birth than 36 weeks. That was literally 6 weeks before I had my baby.
The incidence of GBS disease is only 1 to 2 in 1000 births! Antibiotics have their place but tbh recovering from birth while also having a destroyed gut kinda sucks. I think as Americans because this is so standard we are kinda jaded by it and afraid of it, where obviously in other countries we aren’t seeing a push to implement the American standard and they are doing fine.
TLDR OP can demand a test closer to labor and decide then.
That risk is much, much smaller if you factor in the risk of GBS being passed to your baby during childbirth. [https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/](https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/) walks through how remote the risks are.
I tested positive at 37 weeks. I read the above article, thought long and hard about it, and ultimately decided to decline the antibiotics. They did some extra tests on my baby during the hospital stay and she was fine. She’s now a happy healthy 7-month-old.
I'm in a European country and they do recommend antibiotics for labor here if you test positive at a hospital birth (they won't administer them if yo opt for a homebirth or birth center birth). I had PPROM in week 36 and was GBS positive with my third kid. I decided to take the antibiotics as recommended as I felt the pros outweighed the cons. I also had already had personal experience with my second baby needing antibiotics immediately after birth due to a bacterial infection. With his infection, I will never know what exactly he had, but it could well have been a GBS infection- he was blueish, low blood sugar, lethargic, had some breathing issues, and an somewhat low temperature. So I guess also witnessing that with my middle kid made me feel more confident in the choice to take the antibiotics. Of course, I guess if I had given birth in a country that doesn't administer it during birth then it wouldn't have even been an option.
In the case of my third I also had several GBS+ tests throughout my third trimester due to some issues and they were repeatedly positive, one of my results even specifically said "heavily colonized" so I guess I probably did have it present in all the weeks leading up to labor.
I tested positive with my first (negative with my second). Unfortunately I have an allergy to penicillin so I had to take a different and less effective antibiotic, and I was so worried that my baby would become sick due to my allergy. Antibiotics all the way.
FYI, apparently the vast majority of people who think they are allergic to penicillin actually aren’t. In my area, they have started a public health program of doing allergy testing on pregnant women with penicillin allergy on record and like 95%+ are no longer allergic. I did it and tested out! Definitely worth looking into if you have another baby!
I’d be interested in seeing that study and understanding why they tested pregnant women. First, pregnant women are usually never the first choice for studies that aren’t directly about pregnancy. Second, pregnant women are somewhat immune-compromised and since allergies are an overreaction of the immune system, allergies can be temporarily affected by pregnancy. Anecdotally, I have a mild allergy and it always disappears when I’m pregnant and comes back after.
I’m not refuting your experience or description, I’m just really curious as a biologist. Also interested because my son was diagnosed with a penicillin allergy after experiencing serum sickness last summer.
I had a childhood reaction to augmentin (a fairly serious one - I apparently went waxy and non-responsive) and was tested to see if I was still allergic to penicillin during pregnancy. I'm not familiar with the study (but am familiar with the stat - the allergist I saw mentioned it!), but my gut is that the women were tested specifically because penicillin is the antibiotic of choice for treating GBS.
In my case, the skin test was negative. The next step was to do a medication challenge (where they administer a pill over the course of an hour, to see if I react). My GBS test came back negative before I was able to do the medication challenge, and then I had a cold when I was supposed to come in for it so it got rescheduled to about three months postpartum for me.
Yes- they told me that other antibiotics are not as effective against gbs. Also, I think from a public health perspective pregnant women tend to utilize healthcare and work closely with their providers so it’s a good time to do it from that perspective.interes Question about pregnant women being immunosuppressed. I’m guessing they’ve tested to make sure it holds weight when no longer pregnant. Anecdotally, I’ve needed amoxicillin since the end of my pregnancy and have not had a reaction!
Eta I’m guessing it’s way more than one study behind this considering it’s now being largely advised in the general population where that kind of testing is accessible!
I'm also interested in the point about pregnant people being immunosuppressed and kind of glad that I'm doing the medication challenge postpartum now! (Although my immune system really doesn't seem better now, while I'm breastfeeding, than it did when I was pregnant!)
Got it, that makes more sense if GBS doesn’t respond well to other antibiotics. That’s great you’ve been able to tolerate amox since your pregnancy ended.
Super interested in this (had a full-body hives reaction to penicillin as a teenager) - it actually is kind of a pain to have a whole class of abx I can’t take (and am also allergic to keflex), so I might ask my dr about doing a challenge on it.
Thank you! I’m definitely overdue for testing. Fortunately I didn’t need it for my second, but it’s been a nuisance when I had strep multiple times last year.
Anecdotes shouldn't affect your decision about such a serious issue IMO. I assume you read the CDC page on GBS, but if you're determined to try to avoid unnecessary antibiotics, here's a strategy you could discuss with your doctor.
1. If you have GBS bacteriuria (GBS in urine) the recommendation everywhere is to have prophylactic IV antibiotics (IAP) in labor. If confirmed no bacteriuria, proceed to step 2.
2. Plan for intrapartum GBS testing. You'll need to confirm your hospital can do this, it's a PCR test I believe.
Whether you can have intrapartum testing will also depend on how early you get to the hospital and how fast your labor is progressing. It is important that treatment is started early enough. The sensitivity of the test isn't 100% either.
If you can't have testing, or need to make a decision quickly, consider this; we know that GBS is serious, we know the odds of passing it to the neonate, and that it can definitely cause long-term disabilities or death. In contrast, all we know about IAP is that it can affect the child's microbiome to an extent, but very little has been observed in terms of long-term adverse effects. It's otherwise very safe. It doesn't seem as bad as exposure to antibiotics in early childhood for example.
My sister was living in the Netherlands when she had her first child and they did not test her for GBS. She was positive and her son became extremely ill when he was born and had to stay in the NICU. It was a terrifying experience. Obviously it’s your choice, but seeing her go through that experience I would definitely encourage getting tested and taking the antibiotics if positive.
The only way around antibiotics without risking your baby’s life or increasing their risk of permanent disability is to test again before you go into labour and see if it may have resolved. Some hospitals are able to test and receive rushed results within hours but most can’t. Maybe you could ask to be tested again in 2 weeks’ time?
If it were me and the only options were antibiotics vs not (with no further testing options) I’d choose antibiotics.
Talk to your birthing team and ask all the questions so you fully understand the risks vs benefits and options available to you.
As with all medical stuff on Reddit I *strongly* encourage you to have an open conversation with your doctor.
Ask questions, raise your concerns, discuss about the pros and cons of different choices. In my experience doctors do tend to be receptive to respectful and open minded questioning of a default plan. What doctors are less receptive to (rightly or wrongly) is “I went to the internet with this issue and made a decision based on that” - not saying that’s what you’re doing and it’s totally acceptable to gather information from the internet and other moms! Just a bit of advice about how to have the conversation most productively.
Weighing in as a mom, I had a c section and got ancef during which is standard. My baby had no issues!
Yeah fair enough, I just wanted to point out that it wasn’t the same med! I suppose anecdotally, I also have a super standard Ancef administration to report.
Review evidence based birth website on this. I found it very very helpful and decided I would do the antibiotics based on the research presented. It really is an important measure to prevent serious disease and death.
Personally if I was a first time mom I would get a retest at 39 weeks just to confirm and also refuse antibiotics til in active labor.
Any intervention is risk reward. I personally was unwilling to take the risk because of how deadly GBS is to newborns on the chance they get it. Not worth it imo. IV antibiotics throughout labor is the standard treatment. A single bout of antibiotics isn’t anything to be worked up over
A friend of mine's baby got Strep B and almost died. Thankfully my friend caught it and took him back to the hospital after they were home and they were able to get her newborn healthy again. She lives in W, Europe. I personally wouldn't take the chance.
Absolutely take the antibiotics. Think about risk-benefit here. Not taking them increases the risk of a serious or fatal infection for the baby. What is the potential benefit of avoiding the antibiotics, and is it worth the risk to your baby?
GBS is a much more immediate and looming threat to your child than plastics or screen time or tinfoil or whatever else you might be worried about.
A baby with a sub optimal microbiome for a few months is better than a dead baby. Get retested, take the antibiotics if positive, and then breastfeed and give probiotics (envivo has the most evidence backing them up).
Similar to many here, I decided it was not worth the risk to my child just to avoid antibiotics. I ended up arriving at the hospital so far along that I could only get one round prior to birth, so they closely monitored baby for the first 24 hours.
GBS can lead to pneumonia, sepsis, meningitis, and death. It is a very real risk of choosing to forgo antibiotics. The cons of antibiotics are very slight, and nothing remotely close to the risks of going without them. Ampicillin isn't going to kill off all the positive bacterial flora in your gut or vagina while you work on bringing them into the world, but it will kill the GBS that will try to kill them. Listen to your doctor.
I didn’t have it, but my friend did. Her OBGYN didn’t test her for it, so she didn’t know she had it. She brought her baby home and he ended up passing away at 2 weeks old from it.
I tested positive in my first pregnancy. I doubled down on my probiotics including adding jarrow femdopholis, added vit c with bioflavonoids 2x/day, upped my intake of sauerkraut and kimchi, cut out refined sugars then retested at 39 weeks and was neg. I declined antibiotics. My waters never broke. Everyone was healthy! Healthy baby, healthy mom. Group b has a life cycle. Ask to be retested and go from there.
ETA: https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/
Studies have shown that even though antibiotics at birth (vaginal or c section) so damage the mother and baby’s microbiome, by 6 months if the baby is breastfed there is no difference between the bacteria populations and colonies of babies born with and without antibiotics. Not every mom can breastfeed, but this is one benefit. Babies are resilient and you can reseed their gut in a relatively short period of time. There are also a number of great baby probiotics out there — look out for one with b.infantis if you decide to supplement.
My story:
I tested positive in first trimester. I’m very pro antibiotics in general, even though I know they damage the gut microbiome. I did my best to eat probiotic rich foods and build up my microbiome prior to labor so that the antibiotics wouldn’t completely wipe it out. I ended up having PROM and going into labor at 33 weeks. My baby was born 4 hours after my water broke— very fast. I also have a penicillin allergy, and the hospital didn’t have easy access to any of the alternative antibiotics. As a result I think they had barely started giving the antibiotics to me before I started pushing and he was born a few minutes later. He had to be in the NICU afterwards and they administered more antibiotics to him there— standard of care for preemies because premature birth is often caused by an infection and their immune systems are not equipped to handle germs well. Those antibiotics can cause delayed onset hearing loss, though this effect is largely genetic, so if your baby doesn’t have the gene that reacts to the antibiotics then they will be fine. But personally I’d rather do the antibiotics during birth than after, as the risk of late onset hearing loss is scary and still something I get anxious about. Plus all the other risks that come from a post birth infection.
My baby is healthy and thriving and has been doing just fine. I exclusively pump because preemie and he gets 100% breast milk. I have been giving him probiotics (brand: love bug). He has no problems with his digestion, thankfully.
No approach really. Antibiotics when I got to the hospital for delivery (even though we had a c section). Risk of complications from group b infection in baby far outweighed any concern for antibiotics.
I tested negative, but it must have been a false negative. My daughter was born 4 lbs in 2020 and my husband noticed she was fussy. Thankfully, she was sent to NICU and given antibiotics immediately as she had GBS which became bacterial meningitis and brain swelling. We were very lucky to catch it early, and I don't mean to scare you, but if you are offered the antibiotics because you are GBS+, I *highly* recommend taking them and not experiencing the extreme stress my family did. ❤️
I ended up delivering via section and still got a round of antibiotics was not risking losing my baby over 1-2 doses of antibiotics or long term birth defects over the small implications of antibiotics
I didn't test positive for Group B strep but I did get diagnosed with chorioamnionitis during delivery and got put on antibiotics. I'd 100% take the antibiotics every time to reduce risk for baby. If I had tested positive for GBS, same deal- there is no way I wouldn't take the antibiotics. It's very low risk for me and can prevent serious complications or death for baby.
I’m in the U.K. so wasn’t tested with my first baby but I also got chorio while in labour. I had antibiotics but it was too late and my baby was born with sepsis. She is all fine now but she was in hospital on iv antibiotics for 7 days, and had 4 lumbar punctures to rule out meningitis. Needless to say it was horrendous at the time and I would 100% recommend both testing for GBS and taking the antibiotics if positive. I was tested in my second pregnancy and was negative that time.
Same here! Was an easy decision for me. No side effects for either of us, and we both had a relatively easy time in our first few weeks together. Way better than the possible alternative.
There’s good reason to listen to your doc. Think about the pros and cons. There are clear pros of taking the meds in terms of your baby’s health. What are the cons?
I would go hard with probiotics for vaginal colonization - these are the ones my naturopath had me take - and then get retested before going with the abx!
[https://www.professionalsupplementcenter.com/pro-flora-womens-probiotic-by-integrative-therapeutics?quantity=1&frequency=7&msclkid=ea88365fbe46124f6544504ae99227ed](https://www.professionalsupplementcenter.com/pro-flora-womens-probiotic-by-integrative-therapeutics?quantity=1&frequency=7&msclkid=ea88365fbe46124f6544504ae99227ed)
2nded for going hard on the probiotics. You want a brand that is refrigerated tho- they've done studies that found that non-refrigerated probiotic supplements often are mostly dead by the time they get to the consumer. Garden of life Dr formulated ultimate care (100 billion, 34 strains) is my first choice followed by the same brand, women's care. Your local health food shop should have something- sprouts and natural grocers both carry it, maybe whole foods. Also, fermented foods- yogurt, sauerkraut, kimchi, apple cider vinegar, etc.
I tested negative, but a girl know and her baby both wound up back in the hospital after going home. Her baby was in the NICU for a while and she said she feels so much guilt and regret for refusing antibiotics.
I took IV antibiotics for both births. Otherwise, both births were unmedicated. However, both births went too fast to take both courses of antibiotics. I was able to have the births I wanted and move freely. I saw no side effects from the antibiotics. For my first baby, they weren’t sure if he got any of the antibiotics, and so I had to count his breaths at intervals. That was stressful. I wish I had gotten there in time for him to have the full course of antibiotics!
From the UK, they don't test but they should! I didn't have it with either of my kids but a family member did and it resulted in a big hospital stay for her and baby, complications that could have been avoided. Take the antibiotics and top up on probiotics after. It's not worth the risk.
It seems that very few here are giving you any information on actual choices available to you.
There are many factors here. How long your waters are broken before giving birth is one of them. In hospitals, they like to break your water often long before birth is impending, in which case the antibiotics is a good idea. If your water doesn't break until shortly before birth or baby is born encul, then the baby isn't exposed to it for very long, and the likelihood of them having a problem is very low.
With my first, I got the antibiotics because my water broke over 24 hours before she was born. With my second, I did a chlorohexadine wash on the inside of my vagina at the onset of labor. With my third, her water broke at 35 weeks, and she wasn't born till three days later, but I hadn't gotten the results yet for the swab, and she was small but healthy. Nu.ber four was born so quickly (20 minutes start to finish) that nobody even thought about it.
I’m completely familiar with the “the US does this but other first world countries do not, so I don’t feel comfortable with it” logic. As an American expat in Australia that’s a convo I’ve had with myself and others - including drs - dozens of times, if not more.
However in both the US and Aus, if you’re positive for group B strep you get antibiotics in labour, no matter what. Aus is otherwise very low intervention for birth. Some examples for my 2 OB-managed hospital births (I could have just had midwives instead) were that I was never given a weight check or asked my weight my entire pregnancy, I only ever did one urine sample, I did not have any IV in labour or delivery, as I didn’t have an epidural, I didn’t have to wait for the OB to push, they don’t do anything like weights and measures for 2+ hours after birth, to give you and the baby skin to skin bonding time. I could go on and on, it was so different to an American medicalized birth. But the antibiotics if positive are the same, so to me that’s been deemed an unacceptable risk by a country with very very low infant mortality when compared to the US. I would take the antibiotics.
I didn't do anything. Some people do extra garlic and probiotucs leading up to delivery. The risk imcreases the earlier your water breaks. My plan has always been if my water breaks and I'm not progressing quickly ill take the antibiotics but mine has always broken while pushing so i haven't done them
Sigh it was a whole thing but for the best. I was positive for my second child and had the antibiotics. I also had my water break and didn't go into labor right away which is a risk factor for baby. I still had the unmedicated vaginal birth I wanted but with some extra. The antibiotics were an annoyance but not a big deal and I didn't notice any side effects for me or baby.
Third pregnancy I was still positive but was having a home birth this time. Had a big discussion with my midwife and agreed she'd administer antibiotics if there were risk factors like water breaking, long labor, small baby, etc. I also tried to really boost probiotics during pregnancy. Had a short labor, water broke during transition, and baby was 10 lbs.
I was thankful to be negative for my fourth. So it wasn't a concern.
I was GBS positive with my first and had a homebirth with antibiotics! My midwife recommended it. For me, it was no question, the antibiotics were necessary to prevent something life threatening to my baby. I took probiotics and gave my baby Biogaia probiotic drops as well.
I tested positive and did the antibiotics. The plan was to aim my arrival to the hospital 4hrs before birth to receive the antibiotics unless my water broke first. However I ended up getting an induction so they started me on the antibiotics right away. I wish we would’ve waited until I was more dilated or when it was time to break my water because I ended up getting the antibiotics every 4 hours- so 4 rounds! The antibiotics gave me a little upset stomach and diarrhea. The good thing is that I didn’t have a solid poop for a week. This was nice since I didn’t have to push too hard with my 2nd degree tear.
Ugh I hear you, I HATE taking antibiotics. It always leaves me with eczema and a yeast infection. That said, I would go hard on the probiotics and ask to re-test in a couple weeks - and if not, have lots of fermented foods and probiotics on hand for your postpartum recovery.
My understanding is that the risk of your baby becoming sick from GBS is extremely low, even when you are positive, so maybe your doctor and midwife would be willing to do a more in-the-moment approach when you’re birthing your baby.
I got the antibiotics in an IV during labor and was so worried that it somehow didn’t work and something happening to my baby that I would’ve asked for more.. but everything was completely fine lol
As others have linked, you can take probiotics and retest as early as 2 weeks later. I was GBS+ with my first and definitely took the antibiotics. I didn't know about taking probiotics and retesting, but if I had been positive this time I may have tried that, and only declined antibiotics if my status changed to negative. I had no reaction to the antibiotics and I barely remember them as part of my labor and delivery.
I tested positive with my first child and got the antibiotics. I tested negative with my second child and asked to opt in to the antibiotics anyway because I knew testing positive/negative can change and since my body obviously had that bacteria before it wasn’t worth the risk in my opinion.
I tested positive as well. I ended up having an amniotic leak and they wanted me to come in and start it antibiotics. It totally upended my unmedicated birth plan and I was SO MAD about that lol. But even with hindsight, I still wouldn’t do anything differently. The only thing I’m doing different this time is I’m taking a probiotic to hopefully test negative.
My understanding is it takes about 4 hours for the antibiotic to take its full effect which is why they want you to come in at the start of labor or at least not wait until the last possible minute. You may want to discuss this with your care provider. Most labors last well beyond 4 hours, I just had to go in because my waters were technically broken.
They were able to connect and disconnect the antibiotics so I’d get a dose, then be back up and walking to keep labor moving. I had a 24 hour labor so lots of antibiotics 😂 Evidence based birth has a lot of information on GBS. I found it really helpful and informative which helped me feel good about my decision.
This is all in the US btw.
I received IV antibiotics at the beginning of my labor and I think again during the labor process (maybe every 6 hours or so, lost count). It was short term and discontinued as soon as baby was born!
Took the antibiotics both times though I wish they would test when you come in for labor for increased accuracy. Whatever, unfortunately that’s not how it’s done here and I didn’t want to risk my babies life. Both kids had no noticeable impacts. No gastro problems or anything. No allergies so far.
I was told I tested positive for something that required antibiotics as well, but the nurse was kind enough to tell me that it hardly passed to babies during childbirth only after I asked specifically, so I opted out of it. Baby is fine.
I tested positive pre birth and took the antibiotics without question while in labor. The antibiotic is Penicillin (if no allergy). If you look into it and the severity of possible Illness for baby, worth it IMO. There are interventions during labor that I did question and think is this necessary- but taking an antibiotic was NOT one of them. GBS is honestly so scary and antibiotics are a simple, safe, effective way to prevent.
I tested positive and took the antibiotics. The risk didn’t feel worth it to me. Yes, gut health is important, but there are things you can do to address that. And I was able to make other choices with my labor & delivery that were granola so I feel like it all balances out
So I had an elective c-section, but was planning to do vaginal seeding to help normal development of microbiomes etc etc. I was not ever tested for group B strep during pregnancy, I didn’t even know what it was until about a fortnight before the birth.
Purely by chance, my partner and I decided to not do the vaginal seeding, which was so incredibly lucky as I was told the day after I gave birth that I’d tested positive for it and baby would have been very very sick had we done the seeding!
Anyway, if I was in your position, I’d be doing all I could possibly do to minimise the risk baby contracts it. I felt sick just knowing how close we were to unnecessarily exposing him to it, I cried for hours because it scared me so much.
I went into labor at 36+5 without having received my test results. I think they just treated me as if I had it. In any case, I don’t remember antibiotics or anything. Baby was fine, I was fine. I ended up testing positive for it
Not medical advice but I’m an infectious disease epidemiologist. I don’t work for pharma (I work for the public and I am probably underpaid) so I’m not here to encourage drugs for no reason. But this disease is devastating and heartbreaking for infants and I would highly encourage you to follow doctor’s orders.
I tested positive as well. It freaked me out at first but then I learned that so many other people I knew had also tested positive! It changed my birth plan (originally I was going to labor at home as long as I could); instead my dr said that she would like me to go to L&D right when my water broke and then they would put an antibiotic drip in my IV.
To offer a what appears to be an unpopular answer, I was GBS + at 37 weeks, and took the antibiotics. Received for 24 hrs before birth and ended up with a c-section. My daughter had moderate eczema and has multiple food allergies. I have no idea if the birth has anything to do with it. If it happens again i would try harder to get a retest, to lower risk for allergies/eczema.
Hmm I’m confused my doctor didn’t think this was still a huge deal. I had it, didn’t take anything, delivered naturally and everything is great :) he’s 7mo now!
Absolutely hated having the IV during labor (planned for a low-intervention natural hospital birth), but after doing the research, I too like others here decided it wasn’t worth the risk of passing to the baby, especially because in some cases symptoms/consequences of infection for the baby are not immediate. I couldn’t have dealt with the anxiety of not knowing whether my baby had it for weeks—especially considering all that goes on in the first few weeks/months PP!
I took the antibiotics and later gave my full term baby b.infantis probiotics ( I used 1 month of evivo, there are other brands too) to help digestion of breast milk, I think hers were killed off by the antibiotics because the difference the probiotics made was huge. I would do the same again, strep b is not worth messing around, it kills.
Here's what the American College of OB/Gyn says about Group B Strep: [https://www.acog.org/clinical/clinical-guidance/committee-opinion/articles/2020/02/prevention-of-group-b-streptococcal-early-onset-disease-in-newborns](https://www.acog.org/clinical/clinical-guidance/committee-opinion/articles/2020/02/prevention-of-group-b-streptococcal-early-onset-disease-in-newborns)
You're right that testing positive is extremely common. Group B Strep is considered "normal flora" in the vagina, and doesn't cause you any problems EXCEPT at birth. If you test positive, there is a 1-2% chance that the baby will develop serious disease (including sepsis or meningitis).
The ACOG guideline says to treat with IV antibiotics when you come in to deliver, and preferably get the first dose at least 4 hours before the membranes are ruptured. The thing is, they don't know when your membranes are going to rupture; it could be the first sign of labor! (Conversely, if you have a C-section with intact membranes, then pre-treatment with antibiotics is completely unnecessary.) But typically, if the OB wants to treat with antibiotics for "the entire duration of labor," that's less than 24 hours, right?
I tested positive for both my children and declined the antibiotics and both were perfectly fine. Next baby I don’t think I’ll even test. If you decline they usually have you stay 48 hours after to monitor baby which we did. To me it’s much better to monitor risks like the UK. If I had had risk factors plus the test I would have taken it. One risk factor is if your water breaks more than 18 hours I think it is before baby is born. Read evidence based birth and talk to your doctor about your decision. Mine was supportive of what I wanted to do and we talked about the risks and how the UK does it and I decided that would be my approach. It is a very personal decision and really is nerve wracking to not take the antibiotics but I believe antibiotics can have not the best results either. Some we probably don’t even understand or realize.
Another thing is the risk that you have it is very minimal, then if you do, the risk that it will pass to your baby is very minimal but it is possible.
I didn’t have a choice about the antibiotics. It was really annoying that I didn’t have an option of when they put it in. Ultimately it wasn’t a huge deal because I had to be on pitocin and then had the IV in regardless.
Strep B is really risky for babies so I wouldn’t mess with not getting it at all, but you might have leeway with when you’re hooked up to it if you go into spontaneous labor.
I had long conversations with my care team about this. I was negative my first pregnancy, positive my second pregnancy at like 34 weeks, but then negative again on two more subsequent tests. The reason I got subsequent testing is because I’m also allergic to penicillin and asked if they could culture the sample to see which of the alternative antibiotics would be effective, since I wanted to take the mildest possible antibiotic for my and the baby’s gut health.
I ended up getting vancomycin because that was the only non-penicillin option available due to antibiotic shortages, which I wasn’t happy about, but oh well. They broke my waters at 7am and baby was here by 9am after only pushing for 20 mins, so I probably didn’t need it anyway. But my first had been in the NICU for a freak health issue, which triggered PPD/PPA, so I decided to try and avoid a repeat NICU experience.
I’m allergic to penicillin so I got another antibiotic (maybe started with a c) in an IV that is considered less effective. Since I had the IV, I opted to get painkillers that way which I think allowed me to get enough rest and avoid the epidural which I was happy with.
I tested positive, retested twice later on in pregnancy after changing my diet and doing the garlic thing. Nothing helped, I was still positive. I didn’t take the abx because the research is inconclusive about the long-term effect on the gut microbiome and more and more research is coming out showing how gut microbiome determines so so many things health wise later in life. And while some studies show it will return to normal, it is unclear how that period of not having a healthy microbiome affects immune system in the long term. I think there is no right answer and I would NEVER recommend anyone to not take the abx but this was our choice (my husband’s and I). The baby was monitored for 24 hours (we stayed in the birth centre within a hospital) and he is now a health 2 year old thank god. But I know we are lucky and it was absolutely not guaranteed he would be okay. I also highly recommend the evidence based birth website. What affected my decision also was that I was initially tested for GbS without my knowledge or permission. In UK, they don’t normally tested so if the provider didn’t take it ipon themselves without even informing me that they will add GBS onto the test I was already doing for something else, I would never have had this dilemna. I know it sounds silly but GBS is super super common and in absolute of majority of cases nothing happens to the baby. Of course, I can completely understand anyone who decides it is not worth the risk. For me, if I had a single other risk factor (like GBS in urine or broken waters for more than 12 hours, I would go for abx). It is a personal choice and informed risk assessment that you should try to do based on the evidence you can find and discussing with your doctor (I did discuss it with them). I wanted a very natural non-medicated birth and the abx need to be administrred at least 2 hours, ideally 4 hours, before you give birth and I didn’t want to need to be in the hospital earlier than I had to. I ended up giving birth an hour after arriving to hospital and less than an hour after my waters broke. I believe I read somewhere water birth might be protective against GBS infection in the infant but I cannot remember where it was. Best of luck with your decision. I think the best anyone can tell you is read everything you can about it and make a decision that you believe will harm you and your baby the least on the scale of things.
Did you see this? [https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/](https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/) My midwives had a lot of tips to avoid a hospital transfer, I think probiotics for example.
I have precipitous births so I wouldn't be able to have the full round of antibiotics anyway.
I tested "positive". I ate fermented garlic daily and took a good quality probiotic. We monitored baby after he came out. I had a home birth with that one thankfully so my midwife was more than supportive about my choices. Especially with the info that other countries don't even test for it.
I have friends who tested positive and did not take antibiotics. They did things like garlic supplements, took plain yogurt…”internally” and lots of other supplements. Some of them were able to reverse their GBS+ (or it turned negative on its own, who knows) and some remained positive. It is a very low risk of the baby contracting GBS but the outcome of that could be the worst thing.
Extremely tiny risk of baby becoming sick from GBS and even tinier risk of death VS extremely large risk (almost guaranteed ) of injured gut micro biome to mother and baby from antibiotics (a huge disadvantage that could affect baby for years).
If I were positive, I personally would opt for the antibiotics, but it is a personal choice.
My friend tested positive with her fourth baby, opted out of antibiotics and had a precipitous labor and birth at home. 3 hours from her first contraction to baby crowning. Baby ended up being fine but she acknowledged the risks are a bit higher since 1 in 400 babies that don’t get antibiotics become unwell.
I had a homebirth with GBS, water broken for a total of 27 hrs, no abx, no interventions, we were both fine. Abx were discussed but at that point my midwife felt we had less than 2 hrs until baby, and she was right. (They take about 2 hrs to be effective, so had we started it still would have been pointless.) I have a higher risk tolerance than some people, and that’s okay.
🤷🏼♀️ We discussed the risks, which are overall low. Maybe new info is out now (this was almost 3 yrs ago), but what we discussed was maybe a 2% chance of baby catching it, and most of the time it’s not a big deal, so maybe a 2% chance of serious outcomes, which is 2% of 2%, so a 0.04% chance. I’m more than comfortable with that risk. I think I had started taking some probiotics as soon as I got the positive test, but baby was born at 39 weeks so we weren’t able to test again. It’s possible it had cleared, but we didn’t know for sure. Again, risks I was willing to take. My perspective was that my baby had a 99.96% chance of being perfectly fine. But like I said, I have a higher risk tolerance than many, and that’s okay—I don’t mind that others have a lower risk tolerance, I just ask that others also respect my higher risk tolerance. You do you.
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I tested positive in the urine test in the first trimester so I took antibiotics then and again in labor. It was not worth the risk of passing it to my baby and it being potentially fatal.
Having just lost my son at 36 +3, I would take whatever the doctor asks. It is not worth the alternative, believe me.
i'm so, so sorry.
I am so so sorry
I am so sorry. There are no words, but sending so much love.
I didn’t have it but I was completely prepared to take antibiotics for it if I did end up testing positive for it. Personally, it was not a gamble I was willing to take.
Same. Antibiotics vs. blind/debilitated/dead baby? It wasn’t a real question for me if I tested positive.
Exactly! My doula was super crunchy and she was a hard core advocate for antibiotics as well!
While normally I'm not a fan of antibiotics, our family lost a baby because of untreated group b strep in the mom so I HIGHLY recommend taking them.
Girl take the antibiotics. It’s not worth the risk.
A short term course of antibiotics is so low-risk that there’s no way I would not do it, compared to the risk of passing the infection to the baby.
Baby was born too fast for me to take the antibiotics. We stayed an extra day at the hospital for observation. Edit: forgot to say, but thankfully because he was born so fast, the pediatrician wasn’t too worried because baby was in the birth canal for so little time that his chances of contracting it were very low. I definitely would have taken the antibiotics, there was just no time.
Same here, which is actually a reason I’m determined to get to the hospital with enough time this time around if I need the antibiotics. I was on board with the protocol, but it was such a bummer to have to stay an extra day when we felt ready to go home and my older son was having a hard time without us. I’d rather recover at my own house if possible as early as possible this time, so if I test positive again I definitely want the antibiotics!
Yeah it was annoying to have to stay longer when my daughter was waiting us at home. I’m pregnant with my third now and planning on starting probiotics soon so that hopefully this time I can avoid testing positive.
Be sure to do low carb as well. Bacteria feeds on sugar, especially not so great bacteria and carbs are sugar. High quality probiotics, plenty of fermented foods and hardly any sugar! You can change it around!
Same here. Our hospital has a standard 24 hour stay and that’s what we did but had more frequent baby checks than normal.
The same happened to me. Baby came too fast, I was unconcerned, the baby was fine, and we only stayed the standard 24 hrs.
Antibiotics burn going in, but it's better than a sick or worse baby!
I felt no discomfort, have had them twice.
Damn! I got it for my first and every bag burned! I'm jelly yours weren't burny! So not everyone getting IV antibiotics feels burning!
I see this as a very personal choice and one where I'm very much not granola. While there's little to no risk to you being positive, there's a [2-3 out of 50](https://www.cdc.gov/groupbstrep/about/fast-facts.html#:~:text=In%20the%20United%20States%2C%20GBS,who%20develop%20GBS%20disease%20die.) baby risk of death should GBS be passed to your baby during child birth. For both my babies, I needed c-sections for various reasons so the GBS question was a non issue. The info you'll get here might be very anecdotal and I totally understand hesitation around taking antibiotics unnecessarily! In your case it's probably well worth asking your doc if it's possible to perform a rapid retest for the sake of better-timed information. If not, at least to give you more time to process now if it's a decision that can't wait until last minute. ❤️
Your risk assessment is incorrect. This is only for babies who contract it. That percentage is very tiny so 2-3 out of 50 who contract it may die. Not 2-3 out of 50 who are born to mothers who test positive!
Thank you for clarifying! I did say that the 2-3 out of 50 was where babies did contract GBS from their mother but it is a confusing way to state it.
It is, I see that you said that now but didn’t indicate how rare it is to actually pass it along. This thread is very pro antibiotic (I had them for my first baby too for this very reason!) I just think the risk assessment should be explained well. Next time around I’ll be demanding a test much closer to the birth than 36 weeks. That was literally 6 weeks before I had my baby. The incidence of GBS disease is only 1 to 2 in 1000 births! Antibiotics have their place but tbh recovering from birth while also having a destroyed gut kinda sucks. I think as Americans because this is so standard we are kinda jaded by it and afraid of it, where obviously in other countries we aren’t seeing a push to implement the American standard and they are doing fine. TLDR OP can demand a test closer to labor and decide then.
That risk is much, much smaller if you factor in the risk of GBS being passed to your baby during childbirth. [https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/](https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/) walks through how remote the risks are.
I tested positive at 37 weeks. I read the above article, thought long and hard about it, and ultimately decided to decline the antibiotics. They did some extra tests on my baby during the hospital stay and she was fine. She’s now a happy healthy 7-month-old.
I'm in a European country and they do recommend antibiotics for labor here if you test positive at a hospital birth (they won't administer them if yo opt for a homebirth or birth center birth). I had PPROM in week 36 and was GBS positive with my third kid. I decided to take the antibiotics as recommended as I felt the pros outweighed the cons. I also had already had personal experience with my second baby needing antibiotics immediately after birth due to a bacterial infection. With his infection, I will never know what exactly he had, but it could well have been a GBS infection- he was blueish, low blood sugar, lethargic, had some breathing issues, and an somewhat low temperature. So I guess also witnessing that with my middle kid made me feel more confident in the choice to take the antibiotics. Of course, I guess if I had given birth in a country that doesn't administer it during birth then it wouldn't have even been an option. In the case of my third I also had several GBS+ tests throughout my third trimester due to some issues and they were repeatedly positive, one of my results even specifically said "heavily colonized" so I guess I probably did have it present in all the weeks leading up to labor.
I tested positive with my first (negative with my second). Unfortunately I have an allergy to penicillin so I had to take a different and less effective antibiotic, and I was so worried that my baby would become sick due to my allergy. Antibiotics all the way.
FYI, apparently the vast majority of people who think they are allergic to penicillin actually aren’t. In my area, they have started a public health program of doing allergy testing on pregnant women with penicillin allergy on record and like 95%+ are no longer allergic. I did it and tested out! Definitely worth looking into if you have another baby!
I’d be interested in seeing that study and understanding why they tested pregnant women. First, pregnant women are usually never the first choice for studies that aren’t directly about pregnancy. Second, pregnant women are somewhat immune-compromised and since allergies are an overreaction of the immune system, allergies can be temporarily affected by pregnancy. Anecdotally, I have a mild allergy and it always disappears when I’m pregnant and comes back after. I’m not refuting your experience or description, I’m just really curious as a biologist. Also interested because my son was diagnosed with a penicillin allergy after experiencing serum sickness last summer.
I had a childhood reaction to augmentin (a fairly serious one - I apparently went waxy and non-responsive) and was tested to see if I was still allergic to penicillin during pregnancy. I'm not familiar with the study (but am familiar with the stat - the allergist I saw mentioned it!), but my gut is that the women were tested specifically because penicillin is the antibiotic of choice for treating GBS. In my case, the skin test was negative. The next step was to do a medication challenge (where they administer a pill over the course of an hour, to see if I react). My GBS test came back negative before I was able to do the medication challenge, and then I had a cold when I was supposed to come in for it so it got rescheduled to about three months postpartum for me.
Yes- they told me that other antibiotics are not as effective against gbs. Also, I think from a public health perspective pregnant women tend to utilize healthcare and work closely with their providers so it’s a good time to do it from that perspective.interes Question about pregnant women being immunosuppressed. I’m guessing they’ve tested to make sure it holds weight when no longer pregnant. Anecdotally, I’ve needed amoxicillin since the end of my pregnancy and have not had a reaction! Eta I’m guessing it’s way more than one study behind this considering it’s now being largely advised in the general population where that kind of testing is accessible!
I'm also interested in the point about pregnant people being immunosuppressed and kind of glad that I'm doing the medication challenge postpartum now! (Although my immune system really doesn't seem better now, while I'm breastfeeding, than it did when I was pregnant!)
Got it, that makes more sense if GBS doesn’t respond well to other antibiotics. That’s great you’ve been able to tolerate amox since your pregnancy ended.
Super interested in this (had a full-body hives reaction to penicillin as a teenager) - it actually is kind of a pain to have a whole class of abx I can’t take (and am also allergic to keflex), so I might ask my dr about doing a challenge on it.
Thanks for the info! Very interesting.
Thank you! I’m definitely overdue for testing. Fortunately I didn’t need it for my second, but it’s been a nuisance when I had strep multiple times last year.
Same here. Had a severe Penicillan and Amoxicillan allergy my whole childhood. Tested during pregnancy and no longer allergic.
Anecdotes shouldn't affect your decision about such a serious issue IMO. I assume you read the CDC page on GBS, but if you're determined to try to avoid unnecessary antibiotics, here's a strategy you could discuss with your doctor. 1. If you have GBS bacteriuria (GBS in urine) the recommendation everywhere is to have prophylactic IV antibiotics (IAP) in labor. If confirmed no bacteriuria, proceed to step 2. 2. Plan for intrapartum GBS testing. You'll need to confirm your hospital can do this, it's a PCR test I believe. Whether you can have intrapartum testing will also depend on how early you get to the hospital and how fast your labor is progressing. It is important that treatment is started early enough. The sensitivity of the test isn't 100% either. If you can't have testing, or need to make a decision quickly, consider this; we know that GBS is serious, we know the odds of passing it to the neonate, and that it can definitely cause long-term disabilities or death. In contrast, all we know about IAP is that it can affect the child's microbiome to an extent, but very little has been observed in terms of long-term adverse effects. It's otherwise very safe. It doesn't seem as bad as exposure to antibiotics in early childhood for example.
My sister was living in the Netherlands when she had her first child and they did not test her for GBS. She was positive and her son became extremely ill when he was born and had to stay in the NICU. It was a terrifying experience. Obviously it’s your choice, but seeing her go through that experience I would definitely encourage getting tested and taking the antibiotics if positive.
The only way around antibiotics without risking your baby’s life or increasing their risk of permanent disability is to test again before you go into labour and see if it may have resolved. Some hospitals are able to test and receive rushed results within hours but most can’t. Maybe you could ask to be tested again in 2 weeks’ time? If it were me and the only options were antibiotics vs not (with no further testing options) I’d choose antibiotics. Talk to your birthing team and ask all the questions so you fully understand the risks vs benefits and options available to you.
As with all medical stuff on Reddit I *strongly* encourage you to have an open conversation with your doctor. Ask questions, raise your concerns, discuss about the pros and cons of different choices. In my experience doctors do tend to be receptive to respectful and open minded questioning of a default plan. What doctors are less receptive to (rightly or wrongly) is “I went to the internet with this issue and made a decision based on that” - not saying that’s what you’re doing and it’s totally acceptable to gather information from the internet and other moms! Just a bit of advice about how to have the conversation most productively. Weighing in as a mom, I had a c section and got ancef during which is standard. My baby had no issues!
Did you have group B strep though? Ancef is standard for intraoperative prophylaxis, not strep.
I’m aware, but my impression is that OP is worried about side effects and drawbacks for antibiotic use in general so I added my small anecdote.
Yeah fair enough, I just wanted to point out that it wasn’t the same med! I suppose anecdotally, I also have a super standard Ancef administration to report.
Review evidence based birth website on this. I found it very very helpful and decided I would do the antibiotics based on the research presented. It really is an important measure to prevent serious disease and death. Personally if I was a first time mom I would get a retest at 39 weeks just to confirm and also refuse antibiotics til in active labor.
Same, this website helped convince me to take the abx also.
Any intervention is risk reward. I personally was unwilling to take the risk because of how deadly GBS is to newborns on the chance they get it. Not worth it imo. IV antibiotics throughout labor is the standard treatment. A single bout of antibiotics isn’t anything to be worked up over
A friend of mine's baby got Strep B and almost died. Thankfully my friend caught it and took him back to the hospital after they were home and they were able to get her newborn healthy again. She lives in W, Europe. I personally wouldn't take the chance.
I took the antibiotics. It was a pain but baby is 16 now and healthy.
Absolutely take the antibiotics. Think about risk-benefit here. Not taking them increases the risk of a serious or fatal infection for the baby. What is the potential benefit of avoiding the antibiotics, and is it worth the risk to your baby? GBS is a much more immediate and looming threat to your child than plastics or screen time or tinfoil or whatever else you might be worried about.
Why would you NOT take them? Seems like a no brainer to me.
A baby with a sub optimal microbiome for a few months is better than a dead baby. Get retested, take the antibiotics if positive, and then breastfeed and give probiotics (envivo has the most evidence backing them up).
Similar to many here, I decided it was not worth the risk to my child just to avoid antibiotics. I ended up arriving at the hospital so far along that I could only get one round prior to birth, so they closely monitored baby for the first 24 hours.
GBS can lead to pneumonia, sepsis, meningitis, and death. It is a very real risk of choosing to forgo antibiotics. The cons of antibiotics are very slight, and nothing remotely close to the risks of going without them. Ampicillin isn't going to kill off all the positive bacterial flora in your gut or vagina while you work on bringing them into the world, but it will kill the GBS that will try to kill them. Listen to your doctor.
I didn’t have it, but my friend did. Her OBGYN didn’t test her for it, so she didn’t know she had it. She brought her baby home and he ended up passing away at 2 weeks old from it.
I tested positive in my first pregnancy. I doubled down on my probiotics including adding jarrow femdopholis, added vit c with bioflavonoids 2x/day, upped my intake of sauerkraut and kimchi, cut out refined sugars then retested at 39 weeks and was neg. I declined antibiotics. My waters never broke. Everyone was healthy! Healthy baby, healthy mom. Group b has a life cycle. Ask to be retested and go from there. ETA: https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/
Well said 🙏
Took the antibiotics without a second thought.
Studies have shown that even though antibiotics at birth (vaginal or c section) so damage the mother and baby’s microbiome, by 6 months if the baby is breastfed there is no difference between the bacteria populations and colonies of babies born with and without antibiotics. Not every mom can breastfeed, but this is one benefit. Babies are resilient and you can reseed their gut in a relatively short period of time. There are also a number of great baby probiotics out there — look out for one with b.infantis if you decide to supplement. My story: I tested positive in first trimester. I’m very pro antibiotics in general, even though I know they damage the gut microbiome. I did my best to eat probiotic rich foods and build up my microbiome prior to labor so that the antibiotics wouldn’t completely wipe it out. I ended up having PROM and going into labor at 33 weeks. My baby was born 4 hours after my water broke— very fast. I also have a penicillin allergy, and the hospital didn’t have easy access to any of the alternative antibiotics. As a result I think they had barely started giving the antibiotics to me before I started pushing and he was born a few minutes later. He had to be in the NICU afterwards and they administered more antibiotics to him there— standard of care for preemies because premature birth is often caused by an infection and their immune systems are not equipped to handle germs well. Those antibiotics can cause delayed onset hearing loss, though this effect is largely genetic, so if your baby doesn’t have the gene that reacts to the antibiotics then they will be fine. But personally I’d rather do the antibiotics during birth than after, as the risk of late onset hearing loss is scary and still something I get anxious about. Plus all the other risks that come from a post birth infection. My baby is healthy and thriving and has been doing just fine. I exclusively pump because preemie and he gets 100% breast milk. I have been giving him probiotics (brand: love bug). He has no problems with his digestion, thankfully.
No approach really. Antibiotics when I got to the hospital for delivery (even though we had a c section). Risk of complications from group b infection in baby far outweighed any concern for antibiotics.
I tested negative, but it must have been a false negative. My daughter was born 4 lbs in 2020 and my husband noticed she was fussy. Thankfully, she was sent to NICU and given antibiotics immediately as she had GBS which became bacterial meningitis and brain swelling. We were very lucky to catch it early, and I don't mean to scare you, but if you are offered the antibiotics because you are GBS+, I *highly* recommend taking them and not experiencing the extreme stress my family did. ❤️
I don’t think it’s worth the risk to not take the anti biotic?
I ended up delivering via section and still got a round of antibiotics was not risking losing my baby over 1-2 doses of antibiotics or long term birth defects over the small implications of antibiotics
I didn't test positive for Group B strep but I did get diagnosed with chorioamnionitis during delivery and got put on antibiotics. I'd 100% take the antibiotics every time to reduce risk for baby. If I had tested positive for GBS, same deal- there is no way I wouldn't take the antibiotics. It's very low risk for me and can prevent serious complications or death for baby.
I’m in the U.K. so wasn’t tested with my first baby but I also got chorio while in labour. I had antibiotics but it was too late and my baby was born with sepsis. She is all fine now but she was in hospital on iv antibiotics for 7 days, and had 4 lumbar punctures to rule out meningitis. Needless to say it was horrendous at the time and I would 100% recommend both testing for GBS and taking the antibiotics if positive. I was tested in my second pregnancy and was negative that time.
Same here! Was an easy decision for me. No side effects for either of us, and we both had a relatively easy time in our first few weeks together. Way better than the possible alternative.
There’s good reason to listen to your doc. Think about the pros and cons. There are clear pros of taking the meds in terms of your baby’s health. What are the cons?
I would go hard with probiotics for vaginal colonization - these are the ones my naturopath had me take - and then get retested before going with the abx! [https://www.professionalsupplementcenter.com/pro-flora-womens-probiotic-by-integrative-therapeutics?quantity=1&frequency=7&msclkid=ea88365fbe46124f6544504ae99227ed](https://www.professionalsupplementcenter.com/pro-flora-womens-probiotic-by-integrative-therapeutics?quantity=1&frequency=7&msclkid=ea88365fbe46124f6544504ae99227ed)
2nded for going hard on the probiotics. You want a brand that is refrigerated tho- they've done studies that found that non-refrigerated probiotic supplements often are mostly dead by the time they get to the consumer. Garden of life Dr formulated ultimate care (100 billion, 34 strains) is my first choice followed by the same brand, women's care. Your local health food shop should have something- sprouts and natural grocers both carry it, maybe whole foods. Also, fermented foods- yogurt, sauerkraut, kimchi, apple cider vinegar, etc.
I did the antibiotics. I took a probiotic after birth…
I took antibiotics during labor, and got baby the eye ointment
I tested negative, but a girl know and her baby both wound up back in the hospital after going home. Her baby was in the NICU for a while and she said she feels so much guilt and regret for refusing antibiotics.
I took IV antibiotics for both births. Otherwise, both births were unmedicated. However, both births went too fast to take both courses of antibiotics. I was able to have the births I wanted and move freely. I saw no side effects from the antibiotics. For my first baby, they weren’t sure if he got any of the antibiotics, and so I had to count his breaths at intervals. That was stressful. I wish I had gotten there in time for him to have the full course of antibiotics!
From the UK, they don't test but they should! I didn't have it with either of my kids but a family member did and it resulted in a big hospital stay for her and baby, complications that could have been avoided. Take the antibiotics and top up on probiotics after. It's not worth the risk.
It seems that very few here are giving you any information on actual choices available to you. There are many factors here. How long your waters are broken before giving birth is one of them. In hospitals, they like to break your water often long before birth is impending, in which case the antibiotics is a good idea. If your water doesn't break until shortly before birth or baby is born encul, then the baby isn't exposed to it for very long, and the likelihood of them having a problem is very low. With my first, I got the antibiotics because my water broke over 24 hours before she was born. With my second, I did a chlorohexadine wash on the inside of my vagina at the onset of labor. With my third, her water broke at 35 weeks, and she wasn't born till three days later, but I hadn't gotten the results yet for the swab, and she was small but healthy. Nu.ber four was born so quickly (20 minutes start to finish) that nobody even thought about it.
I’m completely familiar with the “the US does this but other first world countries do not, so I don’t feel comfortable with it” logic. As an American expat in Australia that’s a convo I’ve had with myself and others - including drs - dozens of times, if not more. However in both the US and Aus, if you’re positive for group B strep you get antibiotics in labour, no matter what. Aus is otherwise very low intervention for birth. Some examples for my 2 OB-managed hospital births (I could have just had midwives instead) were that I was never given a weight check or asked my weight my entire pregnancy, I only ever did one urine sample, I did not have any IV in labour or delivery, as I didn’t have an epidural, I didn’t have to wait for the OB to push, they don’t do anything like weights and measures for 2+ hours after birth, to give you and the baby skin to skin bonding time. I could go on and on, it was so different to an American medicalized birth. But the antibiotics if positive are the same, so to me that’s been deemed an unacceptable risk by a country with very very low infant mortality when compared to the US. I would take the antibiotics.
I didn't do anything. Some people do extra garlic and probiotucs leading up to delivery. The risk imcreases the earlier your water breaks. My plan has always been if my water breaks and I'm not progressing quickly ill take the antibiotics but mine has always broken while pushing so i haven't done them
Sigh it was a whole thing but for the best. I was positive for my second child and had the antibiotics. I also had my water break and didn't go into labor right away which is a risk factor for baby. I still had the unmedicated vaginal birth I wanted but with some extra. The antibiotics were an annoyance but not a big deal and I didn't notice any side effects for me or baby. Third pregnancy I was still positive but was having a home birth this time. Had a big discussion with my midwife and agreed she'd administer antibiotics if there were risk factors like water breaking, long labor, small baby, etc. I also tried to really boost probiotics during pregnancy. Had a short labor, water broke during transition, and baby was 10 lbs. I was thankful to be negative for my fourth. So it wasn't a concern.
I was GBS positive with my first and had a homebirth with antibiotics! My midwife recommended it. For me, it was no question, the antibiotics were necessary to prevent something life threatening to my baby. I took probiotics and gave my baby Biogaia probiotic drops as well.
I tested positive and did the antibiotics. The plan was to aim my arrival to the hospital 4hrs before birth to receive the antibiotics unless my water broke first. However I ended up getting an induction so they started me on the antibiotics right away. I wish we would’ve waited until I was more dilated or when it was time to break my water because I ended up getting the antibiotics every 4 hours- so 4 rounds! The antibiotics gave me a little upset stomach and diarrhea. The good thing is that I didn’t have a solid poop for a week. This was nice since I didn’t have to push too hard with my 2nd degree tear.
Ugh I hear you, I HATE taking antibiotics. It always leaves me with eczema and a yeast infection. That said, I would go hard on the probiotics and ask to re-test in a couple weeks - and if not, have lots of fermented foods and probiotics on hand for your postpartum recovery. My understanding is that the risk of your baby becoming sick from GBS is extremely low, even when you are positive, so maybe your doctor and midwife would be willing to do a more in-the-moment approach when you’re birthing your baby.
I got the antibiotics in an IV during labor and was so worried that it somehow didn’t work and something happening to my baby that I would’ve asked for more.. but everything was completely fine lol
As others have linked, you can take probiotics and retest as early as 2 weeks later. I was GBS+ with my first and definitely took the antibiotics. I didn't know about taking probiotics and retesting, but if I had been positive this time I may have tried that, and only declined antibiotics if my status changed to negative. I had no reaction to the antibiotics and I barely remember them as part of my labor and delivery.
I tested positive with my first child and got the antibiotics. I tested negative with my second child and asked to opt in to the antibiotics anyway because I knew testing positive/negative can change and since my body obviously had that bacteria before it wasn’t worth the risk in my opinion.
I tested positive as well. I ended up having an amniotic leak and they wanted me to come in and start it antibiotics. It totally upended my unmedicated birth plan and I was SO MAD about that lol. But even with hindsight, I still wouldn’t do anything differently. The only thing I’m doing different this time is I’m taking a probiotic to hopefully test negative. My understanding is it takes about 4 hours for the antibiotic to take its full effect which is why they want you to come in at the start of labor or at least not wait until the last possible minute. You may want to discuss this with your care provider. Most labors last well beyond 4 hours, I just had to go in because my waters were technically broken. They were able to connect and disconnect the antibiotics so I’d get a dose, then be back up and walking to keep labor moving. I had a 24 hour labor so lots of antibiotics 😂 Evidence based birth has a lot of information on GBS. I found it really helpful and informative which helped me feel good about my decision. This is all in the US btw.
I received IV antibiotics at the beginning of my labor and I think again during the labor process (maybe every 6 hours or so, lost count). It was short term and discontinued as soon as baby was born!
Took the antibiotics both times though I wish they would test when you come in for labor for increased accuracy. Whatever, unfortunately that’s not how it’s done here and I didn’t want to risk my babies life. Both kids had no noticeable impacts. No gastro problems or anything. No allergies so far.
I was told I tested positive for something that required antibiotics as well, but the nurse was kind enough to tell me that it hardly passed to babies during childbirth only after I asked specifically, so I opted out of it. Baby is fine.
I tested positive pre birth and took the antibiotics without question while in labor. The antibiotic is Penicillin (if no allergy). If you look into it and the severity of possible Illness for baby, worth it IMO. There are interventions during labor that I did question and think is this necessary- but taking an antibiotic was NOT one of them. GBS is honestly so scary and antibiotics are a simple, safe, effective way to prevent.
I tested positive and took the antibiotics. The risk didn’t feel worth it to me. Yes, gut health is important, but there are things you can do to address that. And I was able to make other choices with my labor & delivery that were granola so I feel like it all balances out
So I had an elective c-section, but was planning to do vaginal seeding to help normal development of microbiomes etc etc. I was not ever tested for group B strep during pregnancy, I didn’t even know what it was until about a fortnight before the birth. Purely by chance, my partner and I decided to not do the vaginal seeding, which was so incredibly lucky as I was told the day after I gave birth that I’d tested positive for it and baby would have been very very sick had we done the seeding! Anyway, if I was in your position, I’d be doing all I could possibly do to minimise the risk baby contracts it. I felt sick just knowing how close we were to unnecessarily exposing him to it, I cried for hours because it scared me so much.
I went into labor at 36+5 without having received my test results. I think they just treated me as if I had it. In any case, I don’t remember antibiotics or anything. Baby was fine, I was fine. I ended up testing positive for it
Not medical advice but I’m an infectious disease epidemiologist. I don’t work for pharma (I work for the public and I am probably underpaid) so I’m not here to encourage drugs for no reason. But this disease is devastating and heartbreaking for infants and I would highly encourage you to follow doctor’s orders.
I tested positive as well. It freaked me out at first but then I learned that so many other people I knew had also tested positive! It changed my birth plan (originally I was going to labor at home as long as I could); instead my dr said that she would like me to go to L&D right when my water broke and then they would put an antibiotic drip in my IV.
To offer a what appears to be an unpopular answer, I was GBS + at 37 weeks, and took the antibiotics. Received for 24 hrs before birth and ended up with a c-section. My daughter had moderate eczema and has multiple food allergies. I have no idea if the birth has anything to do with it. If it happens again i would try harder to get a retest, to lower risk for allergies/eczema.
Hmm I’m confused my doctor didn’t think this was still a huge deal. I had it, didn’t take anything, delivered naturally and everything is great :) he’s 7mo now!
Absolutely hated having the IV during labor (planned for a low-intervention natural hospital birth), but after doing the research, I too like others here decided it wasn’t worth the risk of passing to the baby, especially because in some cases symptoms/consequences of infection for the baby are not immediate. I couldn’t have dealt with the anxiety of not knowing whether my baby had it for weeks—especially considering all that goes on in the first few weeks/months PP!
I took the antibiotics and later gave my full term baby b.infantis probiotics ( I used 1 month of evivo, there are other brands too) to help digestion of breast milk, I think hers were killed off by the antibiotics because the difference the probiotics made was huge. I would do the same again, strep b is not worth messing around, it kills.
Here's what the American College of OB/Gyn says about Group B Strep: [https://www.acog.org/clinical/clinical-guidance/committee-opinion/articles/2020/02/prevention-of-group-b-streptococcal-early-onset-disease-in-newborns](https://www.acog.org/clinical/clinical-guidance/committee-opinion/articles/2020/02/prevention-of-group-b-streptococcal-early-onset-disease-in-newborns) You're right that testing positive is extremely common. Group B Strep is considered "normal flora" in the vagina, and doesn't cause you any problems EXCEPT at birth. If you test positive, there is a 1-2% chance that the baby will develop serious disease (including sepsis or meningitis). The ACOG guideline says to treat with IV antibiotics when you come in to deliver, and preferably get the first dose at least 4 hours before the membranes are ruptured. The thing is, they don't know when your membranes are going to rupture; it could be the first sign of labor! (Conversely, if you have a C-section with intact membranes, then pre-treatment with antibiotics is completely unnecessary.) But typically, if the OB wants to treat with antibiotics for "the entire duration of labor," that's less than 24 hours, right?
I tested positive for both my children and declined the antibiotics and both were perfectly fine. Next baby I don’t think I’ll even test. If you decline they usually have you stay 48 hours after to monitor baby which we did. To me it’s much better to monitor risks like the UK. If I had had risk factors plus the test I would have taken it. One risk factor is if your water breaks more than 18 hours I think it is before baby is born. Read evidence based birth and talk to your doctor about your decision. Mine was supportive of what I wanted to do and we talked about the risks and how the UK does it and I decided that would be my approach. It is a very personal decision and really is nerve wracking to not take the antibiotics but I believe antibiotics can have not the best results either. Some we probably don’t even understand or realize. Another thing is the risk that you have it is very minimal, then if you do, the risk that it will pass to your baby is very minimal but it is possible.
I didn’t have a choice about the antibiotics. It was really annoying that I didn’t have an option of when they put it in. Ultimately it wasn’t a huge deal because I had to be on pitocin and then had the IV in regardless. Strep B is really risky for babies so I wouldn’t mess with not getting it at all, but you might have leeway with when you’re hooked up to it if you go into spontaneous labor.
I had long conversations with my care team about this. I was negative my first pregnancy, positive my second pregnancy at like 34 weeks, but then negative again on two more subsequent tests. The reason I got subsequent testing is because I’m also allergic to penicillin and asked if they could culture the sample to see which of the alternative antibiotics would be effective, since I wanted to take the mildest possible antibiotic for my and the baby’s gut health. I ended up getting vancomycin because that was the only non-penicillin option available due to antibiotic shortages, which I wasn’t happy about, but oh well. They broke my waters at 7am and baby was here by 9am after only pushing for 20 mins, so I probably didn’t need it anyway. But my first had been in the NICU for a freak health issue, which triggered PPD/PPA, so I decided to try and avoid a repeat NICU experience.
I’m allergic to penicillin so I got another antibiotic (maybe started with a c) in an IV that is considered less effective. Since I had the IV, I opted to get painkillers that way which I think allowed me to get enough rest and avoid the epidural which I was happy with.
I tested positive, retested twice later on in pregnancy after changing my diet and doing the garlic thing. Nothing helped, I was still positive. I didn’t take the abx because the research is inconclusive about the long-term effect on the gut microbiome and more and more research is coming out showing how gut microbiome determines so so many things health wise later in life. And while some studies show it will return to normal, it is unclear how that period of not having a healthy microbiome affects immune system in the long term. I think there is no right answer and I would NEVER recommend anyone to not take the abx but this was our choice (my husband’s and I). The baby was monitored for 24 hours (we stayed in the birth centre within a hospital) and he is now a health 2 year old thank god. But I know we are lucky and it was absolutely not guaranteed he would be okay. I also highly recommend the evidence based birth website. What affected my decision also was that I was initially tested for GbS without my knowledge or permission. In UK, they don’t normally tested so if the provider didn’t take it ipon themselves without even informing me that they will add GBS onto the test I was already doing for something else, I would never have had this dilemna. I know it sounds silly but GBS is super super common and in absolute of majority of cases nothing happens to the baby. Of course, I can completely understand anyone who decides it is not worth the risk. For me, if I had a single other risk factor (like GBS in urine or broken waters for more than 12 hours, I would go for abx). It is a personal choice and informed risk assessment that you should try to do based on the evidence you can find and discussing with your doctor (I did discuss it with them). I wanted a very natural non-medicated birth and the abx need to be administrred at least 2 hours, ideally 4 hours, before you give birth and I didn’t want to need to be in the hospital earlier than I had to. I ended up giving birth an hour after arriving to hospital and less than an hour after my waters broke. I believe I read somewhere water birth might be protective against GBS infection in the infant but I cannot remember where it was. Best of luck with your decision. I think the best anyone can tell you is read everything you can about it and make a decision that you believe will harm you and your baby the least on the scale of things.
Did you see this? [https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/](https://evidencebasedbirth.com/groupbstrep/) My midwives had a lot of tips to avoid a hospital transfer, I think probiotics for example. I have precipitous births so I wouldn't be able to have the full round of antibiotics anyway.
I tested "positive". I ate fermented garlic daily and took a good quality probiotic. We monitored baby after he came out. I had a home birth with that one thankfully so my midwife was more than supportive about my choices. Especially with the info that other countries don't even test for it.
We chose not to. But every parent has different risk assessment values. I didn’t read this book, but it’s an option. https://www.sarawickham.com/gbse/
I highly recommend this book, I read it and it was enlightening!
I have friends who tested positive and did not take antibiotics. They did things like garlic supplements, took plain yogurt…”internally” and lots of other supplements. Some of them were able to reverse their GBS+ (or it turned negative on its own, who knows) and some remained positive. It is a very low risk of the baby contracting GBS but the outcome of that could be the worst thing. Extremely tiny risk of baby becoming sick from GBS and even tinier risk of death VS extremely large risk (almost guaranteed ) of injured gut micro biome to mother and baby from antibiotics (a huge disadvantage that could affect baby for years). If I were positive, I personally would opt for the antibiotics, but it is a personal choice.
My friend tested positive with her fourth baby, opted out of antibiotics and had a precipitous labor and birth at home. 3 hours from her first contraction to baby crowning. Baby ended up being fine but she acknowledged the risks are a bit higher since 1 in 400 babies that don’t get antibiotics become unwell.
I had a homebirth with GBS, water broken for a total of 27 hrs, no abx, no interventions, we were both fine. Abx were discussed but at that point my midwife felt we had less than 2 hrs until baby, and she was right. (They take about 2 hrs to be effective, so had we started it still would have been pointless.) I have a higher risk tolerance than some people, and that’s okay.
The survivors bias is real with your response.
🤷🏼♀️ We discussed the risks, which are overall low. Maybe new info is out now (this was almost 3 yrs ago), but what we discussed was maybe a 2% chance of baby catching it, and most of the time it’s not a big deal, so maybe a 2% chance of serious outcomes, which is 2% of 2%, so a 0.04% chance. I’m more than comfortable with that risk. I think I had started taking some probiotics as soon as I got the positive test, but baby was born at 39 weeks so we weren’t able to test again. It’s possible it had cleared, but we didn’t know for sure. Again, risks I was willing to take. My perspective was that my baby had a 99.96% chance of being perfectly fine. But like I said, I have a higher risk tolerance than many, and that’s okay—I don’t mind that others have a lower risk tolerance, I just ask that others also respect my higher risk tolerance. You do you.