EDMONTON – A national research team is looking for pregnant women in the Edmonton area to take part in a study on whooping cough – formally known as pertussis – which can be fatal for newborns.
The condition is preventable, since there is a vaccine. But in Canada, babies aren’t scheduled to receive the shot until they’re two months old, since their immune systems are more developed at that age. If they are exposed to the bacterial disease before then, they can become seriously ill. In Alberta since 2011, two infants have died from it.
Dr. Wendy Vaudry, a pediatric infectious disease specialist and researcher, explains that because newborns don’t have very strong respiratory muscles, instead of taking a sharp breath between coughs, they’ll just stop breathing. She says the pertussis may also spread to a baby’s lungs, and cause severe pneumonia, which can be fatal.
“It’s a very terrible thing to watch a baby die of that. That’s what motivates me to do the research, because we have to do something better for these very young babies,” Vaudry says.
The national research team, which Vaudry is a part of, hopes immunizing pregnant women with the whooping cough vaccine will allow them to develop high levels of antibodies to pass on to their baby. The vaccine is already recommended for pregnant women in the U.S.
In Canada, about 100 expectant mothers have so far taken part in the study, which carefully monitors them for risk. Registered nurse Sheena McQuarrie is one of them, signing up as soon as she found out she was pregnant.
“Just seeing babies that sick and with that deep of a cough and that restricted of an airway was scary. Especially when you know it’s preventable,” McQuarrie says, holding her new baby girl. “It’s definitely a real thing and a concern to me, personally, so I wanted to make sure she had the extra protection.”
The new mother admits that it is somewhat of an intensive study, involving a shot in your last trimester, as well as going for a physical and bloodwork. Once you give birth, your baby also needs to get blood work done, and you need to give breast milk samples.
Still, for McQuarrie, it was time well spent.
“It’s a real opportunity to do something for your own baby,” says Vaudry of participating in the study, “but I think, more importantly, for all newborn babies.”
Expectant moms interested in participating in the Edmonton arm of the study are asked to phone the research co-ordinator at 780-735-6641.
With files from Su-Ling Goh, Global News
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