Search

Administering erythromycin to pregnant women with vaginal infections may not be successful in preventing preterm delivery or low birth weight in infants. Researchers studied 938 pregnant women with group B streptococci vaginal infections to see if erythromycin given in the third trimester would resolve the infection and prevent preterm delivery. Preterm deliveries and the number of low birthweight infants were not reduced significantly. The effects of erythromycin in the study may not have been dramatic because only 385 of the women were very infected. Erythromycin administered earlier in pregnancy may be more effective in preventing pregnancy problems.

Prematurity and low birth weight are the major causes of newborn illness and death in the US. Genital infections have been implicated as a cause of prematurity and low birth weight, but the association between infections with organisms such as Ureaplasma urealyticum and poor pregnancy outcome has not been consistent. A large study involving several hospitals was conducted to determine whether genital infections and pregnancy outcome were related. In this report, 4,934 women were evaluated for vaginal infections with U. urealyticum between 23 and 26 weeks of gestation. The organism was present in 66 percent of the women studied, and was the most common organism found. The organism was more commonly found in black women, in those carrying their first child, and in unmarried women, and significantly decreased with increasing age, income, and education. The presence of the organism was also significantly related to smoking and to a more frequent number of sexual partners. U. urealyticum was somewhat associated with delivery of a low-birth weight infant, but this was not independent of other factors such as ethnicity, smoking, past number of children delivered, and presence of another organism. It is concluded that genital infection with U. urealyticum is not significantly associated with a poor pregnancy outcome. Therefore, tests for this infection in pregnant women to predict those at high risk are not justified. (Consumer Summary produced by Reliance Medical Information, Inc.)