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Spread of Salmonella typhi in a maternity hospital

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 May 2009

G. A. J. Ayliffe ,
A. M. Geddes ,
J. E. Pearson  and
T. C. Williams
G. A. J. Ayliffe
Affiliation:
Regional Health Service Infection Research Laboratory, Dudley Road Hospital, Birmingham B18 7QH
A. M. Geddes
Affiliation:
Department of Communicable and Tropical Disease, East Birmingham Hospital, Birmingham 9
J. E. Pearson
Affiliation:
Solihull Area Health Authority, West Midlands
T. C. Williams
Affiliation:
Marston Green Maternity Hospital, Marston Green, Birmingham
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Summary

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An Asian patient with undiagnosed typhoid fever was admitted to a maternity hospital and delivered within 10 mm. Salmonella typhi (phage type D5) was isolated from her blood and from the faeces of her baby. Another woman in a different room of the labour suite at the same time acquired the same organism in her faeces; her brother was admitted to the Infectious Diseases Unit 5 weeks later with typhoid fever. Two babies, born over 60 h after the index case was delivered, became faecal excreters of the same strain and one of them also developed S. typhi osteitis of the hip. These two babies and their mothers were in the same ward as each other, but not that occupied by the infected mother and her baby. Nine other excreters in two of the families involved were identified. The index case and her baby were isolated immediately after delivery, and the relevant rooms in the labour suite were adequately disinfected. No evidence of undisinfected equipment used by the index case and the other infected patients was found, and no spread to staff was detected. The mode of spread remains unknown.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Hygiene , Volume 82 , Issue 3 , June 1979 , pp. 353 - 359
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1979

References

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