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Postpartum infections, also known as childbed fever and puerperal fever, are any bacterial infections of the female reproductive tract following childbirth or miscarriage. [1] Signs and symptoms usually include a fever greater than 38.0 °C (100.4 °F), chills, lower abdominal pain, and possibly bad-smelling vaginal discharge . [ 1 ]
Vienna General Hospital in 1784. Semmelweis worked at the maternity clinic. Copper engraving by Josef & Peter Schafer. Historically, puerperal fever was a devastating disease. It affected women within the first three days after childbirth and progressed rapidly, causing acute symptoms of severe abdominal pain, fever and debility.
Ignaz Semmelweis Semmelweis, aged 42 in 1860, photograph by Borsos and Doctor Born Semmelweis Ignác Fülöp (1818-07-01) 1 July 1818 Buda, Hungary, Austrian Empire (now Budapest, Hungary) Died 13 August 1865 (1865-08-13) (aged 47) Oberdöbling, Austrian Empire (now Vienna, Austria) Citizenship Kingdom of Hungary Alma mater University of Vienna Known for Introducing hand disinfection standards ...
GAS is an important cause of puerperal fever worldwide, causing serious infection and, if not promptly diagnosed and treated, death in newly delivered mothers. Severe GAS disease may also occur in healthy persons with no known risk factors.
Puerperal fever was a deadly infection, common in mid-19th-century hospitals. Semmelweis proposed the practice of washing hands with chlorinated lime solutions in 1847 while working in Vienna General Hospital's First Obstetrical Clinic, where doctors' wards had three times the mortality of midwives' wards. [1]
A postpartum disorder or puerperal disorder is a disease or condition which presents primarily during the days and weeks after childbirth called the postpartum period.The postpartum period can be divided into three distinct stages: the initial or acute phase, 6–12 hours after childbirth; subacute postpartum period, which lasts two to six weeks, and the delayed postpartum period, which can ...
"The disease, known as Puerperal Fever, is so far contagious as to be frequently carried from patient to patient by physicians and nurses." [ 4 ] The end of the essay included eight steps which birth attendants needed to adhere to in order to prevent the spread of infection from patient to patient, especially infected patients to susceptible ...
Asserting that puerperal fever was a contagious disease and that matter from autopsies was implicated in its spread, Semmelweis made doctors wash their hands with chlorinated lime water before examining pregnant women. He then documented a sudden reduction in the mortality rate from 18% to 2.2% over a period of a year.