Bacterial vaginosis is a highly prevalent and poorly understood polymicrobial disorder of the vaginal microbiota, with significant adverse sequelae. Gardnerella vaginalis predominates in bacterial vaginosis. Biofilms of G. vaginalis are present in human infections and are implicated in persistent disease, treatment failure, and transmission. Here we demonstrate that G. vaginalis biofilms contai...

BACKGROUND Group B streptococcus colonization in pregnant women usually has no symptoms, but it is one of the major factors of newborn infection in developed countries. In Iran, there is a little information about the prevalence of maternal colonization and newborns infected by group B streptococcus. In order to find the necessary information to create a protocol for prevention and treatment of...

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES Group B beta haemolytic streptococcus (GBS) is a frequent colonizer of the maternal genital tract causing peripartum fever, puerperal sepsis, neonatal sepsis and neonatal meningitis. The conventional methods for detection of maternal colonization take 24-48 h. We made an attempt to standardize a rapid enrichment cum antigen detection test to screen pregnant women for GBS...

A group B streptococcus recovered from a blood specimen from a neonate with sepsis was used to evaluate the use of mice for studies characterizing the hematogenous virulence and the asymptomatic mucosal colonization of the vagina or of the respiratory tract by these bacteria. When injected intravenously, the 50% lethal dose for mice was 10(6); however, as few as 10(2) organisms produced septic ...

OBJECTIVES While early-onset neonatal GBS sepsis is positively associated with premature birth and prolonged rupture of membranes, there is debate in the literature as to whether maternal GBS colonization is a predictor of adverse obstetric outcome. This is a critical issue to resolve for appropriate management (expectant vs. interventional management) of the patient presenting with premature r...

BACKGROUND Maternal vaginal colonization with Streptococcus agalactiae (Group B Streptococcus [GBS]) is a precursor to chorioamnionitis, fetal infection, and neonatal sepsis, but the understanding of specific factors in the pathogenesis of ascending infection remains limited. METHODS We used a new murine model to evaluate the contribution of the pore-forming GBS β-hemolysin/cytolysin (βH/C) t...