Women who receive preventive antibiotics after giving birth are 42 percent less likely to develop an infection, according to a study published in The Lancet.
The study involved 3,427 British women who underwent childbirth involving forceps or vacuum extraction between March 2016 and June 2018. Researchers randomly assigned women to one of two groups who received either a shot of the antibiotic treatment Augmentin or a placebo shot within six hours of giving birth, reports The New York Times.
After six weeks, 11 percent of women who received the antibiotic had a suspected or confirmed infection, compared to 19 percent of women in the control group. Women in the antibiotic group also had a 56 percent lower chance of developing a systemic infection.
Researchers determined that every 100 doses of antibiotics administered prophylactically could prevent 168 doses from being used to treat infections.