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General => The Common Room => Topic started by: Aunt Sally on Friday 30 May 08 18:49 BST (UK)

Title: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Aunt Sally on Friday 30 May 08 18:49 BST (UK)
Great great grandmother died of this.  Obviously to do with childbirth, but does anyone know what it was exactly?

Best wishes,

Sally
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: ricky1 on Friday 30 May 08 18:54 BST (UK)
Hi Sally
Found this by googling about
Milk fever
 A mild fever, usually occurring at the beginning of lactation, associated with infection following childbirth 

ricky
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Aunt Sally on Friday 30 May 08 19:04 BST (UK)
Hello Ricky,

Thanks for answering my question.

Best wishes,

Sally
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Helen D on Friday 30 May 08 19:05 BST (UK)
Cows get it! ::)

 I think it is caused by a lack of magnesium brought on by lactation, but I may be wrong, and of course the human version may be different!

Helen
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: pjbuk007 on Friday 30 May 08 19:09 BST (UK)
ricky1, I think you got that definition here:

http://cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/omd?milk+fever

Unfortunately this site is just an automated dictionary - and usually IMHO not very useful for medical terms for genealogists.

Milk Fever nowadays refers to a disease of cows.

Formerly, and sometimes now, it would refer to mastitis, ie infection/inflammation of the lactating breast in humans.

However, it is usually in historical/genealogical terms taken to mean puerperal fever, which is an infection in a recently-delivered woman.

Commonly this would be an overwhelming sepsis which killed women pre-antibiotics.  Often this would be via the umbilical cord being cut with a dirty instrument (this is a very common cause of maternal mortality in the developing world today), leading to tetanus. or the labour being prolonged allowing infection via the intr-uterine route.  Or almost any other serious infection.

Hope this helps.

Just seen two last posts - google is not your friend in this case, sorry!


Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Keziahemm on Friday 30 May 08 19:15 BST (UK)
Cows get it! ::)

 I think it is caused by a lack of magnesium brought on by lactation, but I may be wrong, and of course the human version may be different!

Helen

In cows lack of calcium - have to be given injections of calcium solution which contains magnesium and phosphate(?).  Poor things very often go down and a real job to get them to their feet, if they don't they bloat and die  :'(  

Wonder if similar with humans in the past, before symptoms were recognised and treated?

Susan  :)

Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: ricky1 on Friday 30 May 08 19:16 BST (UK)
Hi Pj

didnt get it from that site, got it from
http://rmhh.co.uk/index.html

but if you google old ailments comes up with loads of site about milk fever
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: liverpool annie on Friday 30 May 08 19:24 BST (UK)

It was extremely painful !!  :-\ :-\

and there was nothing that they were able to take in those days ..... except maybe castor oil  :P

a woman had to be bound very tightly and walk around if she could - like an Amazon woman !!

The fever could become very high .... and the woman was debilitated ..... an awful way to die !  :-\ :-\ :-\

And because they couldn't feed ..... the babies were in danger too !


Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Dancing Master on Friday 30 May 08 19:57 BST (UK)
It was known as milk fever but the correct name was Purpueral Fever ie  Puerperal fever - Elevated temperature after giving birth to an infant
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: pjbuk007 on Friday 30 May 08 22:30 BST (UK)
Yes, Dancing master, you are right, all this stuff about calcium, magnesium, cows and binding breasts is a snare and a delusion as I put less succinctly than you in my previous post!
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: pjbuk007 on Friday 30 May 08 22:32 BST (UK)
The term milk fever would have been used for puerperal fever in the 19th century.

It meant an infection occurring immediately after giving birth.

The term milk fever as used today refers in the main to cows and has a different aetiology entirely!
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: celia on Saturday 31 May 08 11:19 BST (UK)
Quote
It meant an infection occurring immediately after giving birth.
Well whatever you call it,the mother was probably  a carrier of an infection passed onto the  unfortunate babby

Celia
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Arranroots on Saturday 31 May 08 11:50 BST (UK)
I disagree!

I had "milk fever" - a complication of mastitis which involves septicaemia - which would have done for me if it weren't for antibiotics.

The sepsis affects the mother but does no harm to the baby - in fact for mastitis one of the best remedies is to feed the young (calf or human!!  ;D ) from the affected breast/ quarter.

I have never been so poorly and can vouch for its being associated with a very high fever.  As for pain - I was feeling nothing by that stage!

I was so lucky that my midwife knew what was going on and appropriate drugs could cure it in a jiffy!

A  ;)
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: LoneyBones on Saturday 31 May 08 11:56 BST (UK)
Agree with Arranroots. Have had several bouts of what my widwife called Milk Fever and my GP called Mastitis. A hot shower eased the pain a little, not feeding wasn't an option so I had lots of hot showers.
Leonie.
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: celia on Sunday 01 June 08 12:10 BST (UK)
Quote
The term milk fever as used today refers in the main to cows and has a different aetiology entirely!

That was the bit that confused me ??? Cows and Humans with milk fever ??? So thank you Arran and Leonie for the explanation.I didn't know milk fever was still around,it must have been an awful for you having that.Thanks for sharing it

Celia
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Nick29 on Sunday 01 June 08 12:54 BST (UK)
It was known as milk fever but the correct name was Purpueral Fever ie  Puerperal fever - Elevated temperature after giving birth to an infant

That's correct - my maternal grandmother died from it at 34 years of age, just 7 days after giving birth to twins.  And sadly, 100 years later, despite the huge advances in medicine, women still die from it.

It's also known as "Child Bed Fever" - see this link (http://www.jessicastrust.org.uk/tag/childbed-fever/)  :-\

Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: pjbuk007 on Sunday 01 June 08 13:06 BST (UK)
You are right, Nick, and a good link.

The term Milk Fever was used for ovrewhelming sepsis soon after giving birth (as the milk was coming in), and would usually mean puerperal fever, NOT mastitis and its' sequelae.

Mastitis can certainly be very painful and RARELY lead to serious consequences as in Arranroots' awful experience.  But the biggest killer was the sepsis IN THE WOMB and Milk Fever was the term used for this.
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Arranroots on Sunday 01 June 08 22:02 BST (UK)
I still disagree that puerperal fever or childbed fever are the same thing - as the name suggests, milk fever is associated with lactation and inflammation which may lead (in severe cases) to sepsis.

Puerperal fever is more commonly associated with the birth process and the infection is associated with that area - trying not to be too graphic here!!

Midwifery and the Diseases of Women by Joel Shew A contemporary account, 1853

Quote

In the course of two or three days usually after the birth of the child, the woman experiences more or less febrild excitement of the system.  This is what is termed Milk Fever, it being connected with the coming on of the lacteal secretion....

Puerperal or childbed fever is a very different thing from the foregoing, and is reckoned by physicians as being one of the most fearful of maladies.


Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Nick29 on Sunday 01 June 08 22:07 BST (UK)
They probably aren't the same thing, but (as at least one other poster has said) milk fever is rarely fatal, so if a death certificate says that a woman has died from milk fever, it has probably been mis-diagnosed.

Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: ricky1 on Sunday 01 June 08 22:11 BST (UK)
They probably aren't the same thing, but (as at least one other poster has said) milk fever is rarely fatal, so if a death certificate says that a woman has died from milk fever, it has probably been mis-diagnosed.



Dont forget we are talking about over 100 years ago. This day and age it might be called something else ??? ???.

ricky
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Arranroots on Sunday 01 June 08 22:18 BST (UK)
Any kind of infection may potentially be fatal.   ???

We are talking about the days before antibiotics when you could die from even minor cuts and grazes.

Infection in the breast, or the womb or the finger could all lead to major infection and death.

We are so incredibly lucky these days that we don't have to worry about these things.

Apart from those antibiotic-resistant infections which we hear so much about - but that's another topic ...

Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Nick29 on Monday 02 June 08 09:00 BST (UK)
I'm sorry, I don't want to appear argumentative,  but puerperal fever is a "simple infection" that was killing women 100 years ago, and unfortunately it still is, in fairly significant numbers.  If the symptoms are not spotted early enough, it can (and does) kill young and physically fit women.  The failure is in the diagnosis, not the treatment, and once sepsis has set in, antibiotics cannot always save the mother's life.

Sufficient people thought it to be a significant problem in 2007 to start an electronic petition to the Prime Minister (http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/maternaldeath/), and although 3895 people signed the petition, the government didn't think it important enough to do anything about.  Although puerperal fever still accounts for 12% of all post-birth maternal deaths, the government thought that the overall maternal death rate was low enough not to worry about it.

My father's life was ruined when his mother died of this disease at 34, when he was 6 years old, and despite huge medical advances, it is still leaving children without mothers today, and with a little more public awareness, this could be eliminated. 
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: pjbuk007 on Monday 02 June 08 11:34 BST (UK)
Arranroots and others, I cannot find the reference, but Milk Fever WAS used to refer to what is truly puerperal sepsis, certainly in the 19th century and previously.  I worked on maternal mortality, including the history of it, for WHO and as a research project many years ago, and also have been reading a great deal on women's health & social problems in history more recently.  As I understand it,  Milk Fever was used for fevers occurring in the early phase of lactation, when the milk was coming in.  It was not necessarily causally related to lactation, but happened at the same time, as puerperal sepsis does.

So I am sure that the woman in question COULD have died from an overwhelming infection secondary to mastitis, but it is also possible that she died from puerperal sepsis, and in my view that is more likely. 

As Nick29 says, this is a significant and tragic cause of mortality in mothers to this day, and occurs even more frequently in the developing world. 
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: JAP on Monday 02 June 08 12:24 BST (UK)
Hi pjbuk007,

Thanks for your very sensible and well-informed contributions.

My immediate reaction to this thread was 'puerperal fever' as everything I'd read heretofore told me that 'milk fever' on death certs normally meant 'puerperal fever' (pelvic infections) - and almost invariably did not mean mastitis nor any other sort of fever/infection.

I didn't bother posting earlier but here's a link which may be of interest to this thread:
http://www.rootschat.com/links/03jy/

JAP
PS: Arranroots, Mastitis eh!  Speaking from personal experience I can only say that it was incredibly painful  ::)
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Viktoria on Tuesday 11 November 08 23:33 GMT (UK)
Milk fever is the common name for puerperal fever which is a massive infection caused by poor hygiene on the part of whoever cared for a newly delivered mother.It was very common at one time in the days before asepsis was carried out ie prevention of infection by hand scrubbing ,rubber gloves and clean sterilised linen. It was very prevalent in hospitals in the 1800`s when the doctors had so little regard for hygiene and no respect for women that they did the ward rounds of the maternity patients AFTER they had done dissections in the mortuary!!!I t was called milk fever because the onset came at roughly the same time as a new mother started to lactate and it was thought to be caused by the production of the breast milk but in hospitals the doctors brought the infection to women on their hands and clothes which they did not wash or change from the post mortems they carried out.You can imagine how dangerous that was-to make an internal examination with filthy hands. Instruments like forceps were not sterilised either. midwifery was a very neglected branch of medicine  mostly carried out by unqualified women because doctors did not think it worth their attention. In the very poor conditions at the time by way of houses with no running water and certainly no hot water supply it is understandable that conditions were condusive to such infections,most births were at home  after all but through genuine lack of understanding of basic hygiene thosands of women died each year from `"milk fever" and the very poor who were badly nourished had no strength to resist it. hope this has proved helpful.
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: pjbuk007 on Wednesday 12 November 08 08:05 GMT (UK)
Yes, and there is a good explanation which confirms what I and others said on pages 105, 106 and onwards of JAP's excellent link.
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: pennine on Thursday 13 November 08 23:27 GMT (UK)
I always thought 'Child bed fever' is what we know today as eclampsia, whereby the mother begins to have fits due to toxins in the blood. If the child isn't delivered pronto both mother and child die. In some cases the child was delivered safely by ceasarian but the mother alas didn't survive.

Pennine
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: pjbuk007 on Thursday 13 November 08 23:45 GMT (UK)
No, I think that is quite different.

In eclampsia the woman, untreated would probably have had fits and died. 

http://www.gpnotebook.co.uk/simplepage.cfm?ID=369491974

Childbed fever/Milk Fever etc have a very different picture (of overwhelming infection) which 19th century physicians would pretty certainly have recognised.
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: pennine on Friday 14 November 08 00:22 GMT (UK)
Thanks for that. I know we are talking about then.
My daughter had eclampsia in 1993. We know now that she had all the classic symptoms of pre-eclampsia recognised by the medical profession but not picked up by them. When she started fitting I called an ambulance and even the ambulance men told me to let her 'sleep it off'. They had not got a clue. I was not so stupid I insisted she be taken to hospital. On arrival she fitted again and was immediately given an emergency ceasarian. The baby was fit and well but my daughter remained in intensive care under sedation for 7 days and it was touch and go for a while. On her second pregnancy there was no question at a different hospital she was booked in for a ceasarian and the birth was without problems.
In those days I could understand the lack of knowledge but as late as 1993 I have problems with their explanation that 'no one can predict'. A week before we know now that she was suffering all the classic symptoms and had even had a blood test mid week. When we complained after the event the blood test results had  mysteriously 'disappeared'. We thought about suing but I was so grateful to have my daughter and grandson alive and well that we didn't bother.

Pennine
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: jinks on Friday 14 November 08 09:04 GMT (UK)
My Great Grandmother also died from 'Milk Fever' after childbirth

I was puzzled as to why an infection due to breast feeding could
cause death.

The story I was told was whilst breast feeding my Great Aunt she
contracted some so of brain fever that contributed to her ending up
in a mental institution where she later died.

I was also informed that this disease is now cureable

Jinks
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Nick29 on Friday 14 November 08 09:17 GMT (UK)
I was also informed that this disease is now cureable

Jinks

It is (and it's really an infection, rather than a disease), but as I said in an earlier post, the problem is in the diagnosis and not the cure.   Quite often, by the time the effects of the infection have shown themselves, it's too late to cure it.   Which is why 12% of post-maternal deaths in the 21st century are still from puerperal fever.
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: jinks on Friday 14 November 08 12:26 GMT (UK)
Thanks for that Nick

My Great Aunt mentioned in the previous post is still very much alive
having lost her Mother at a very early age.

Jinks
Title: Re: What is Milk Fever?
Post by: Lydart on Saturday 15 November 08 19:38 GMT (UK)
I disagree!

I had "milk fever" - a complication of mastitis which involves septicaemia - which would have done for me if it weren't for antibiotics.

The sepsis affects the mother but does no harm to the baby - in fact for mastitis one of the best remedies is to feed the young (calf or human!!  ;D ) from the affected breast/ quarter.

I have never been so poorly and can vouch for its being associated with a very high fever.  As for pain - I was feeling nothing by that stage!

I was so lucky that my midwife knew what was going on and appropriate drugs could cure it in a jiffy!

A  ;)



Totally agree with AR on this one ... it is AGONY !  Red hot, burning, aching, sore boob ... and AR is also right in that feeding the baby is just about the only way to relieve it ... but my goodness, it hurts !      :'( :'( :'( :'(

Anti-biotics deal with it ... mine was caused, so the doc thought, by a dead ended or closed milk duct ... the milk flowed in but there was no way out for it ...

... but I managed to feed four strapping babies, so all was well !

Thanks goodness I never have to do that again ...