E. coli Infection Quadruples Risk Of Cerebral Palsy.

Group B Strep. infection of the amniochorionic membranes triples risk.

QUEBEC CITY -- Very-low-birth-weight infants with Escherichia coli of the amniochorionic membranes are at more than four times the risk of having cerebral palsy, compared with those without the infection, Helen M. McDonald, Ph.D., said.

And those whose membranes are infected with group B streptococcus (GBS) have nearly three times the risk, she reported at the annual meeting of the Infectious Diseases Society for Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Although these findings may someday have important clinical implications, for now, routine practice shouldn't change. Suppression of labor is already ill advised in the woman who has threatened preterm labor and signs of infection. But as this study shows, "a lot of times we really don't know that infection is present," she said.

Dr. McDonald and her associates at the University of Adelaide (Australia) were among the first investigators to home in on the link between specific pathogens and cerebral palsy.

"This is such a tremendous accomplishment and contribution to this area to begin to draw that link between inflammation to the organisms that might be involved," one attendee noted.

Previous studies in humans and animal models established that intrauterine infection plays a role in cerebral palsy, especially in low-birth-weight babies.