Antibiotic therapy is the backbone of puerperal infection treatment.

Puerperal infection affects an estimated 1-8% of new mothers in the United States.

The term puerperal infection refers to a bacterial infection following childbirth.

Puerperal fever (from the Latin puer, child), also called childbed fever, can develop into puerperal sepsis, which is a serious form of septicaemia contracted by a woman during or shortly after childbirth, miscarriage or abortion. If untreated, it is life-threatening. The most common infection causing puerperal fever is genital tract sepsis. Other types of infection that can lead to sepsis after childbirth include urinary tract infection, breast infection (mastitis) and respiratory tract infection (more common after anaesthesia due to lesions in the windpipe). Puerperal fever is now rare in the West due to improved hygiene during delivery, and deaths have been reduced by antibiotics.

The most typical site of infection is the genital tract. Endometritis, which affects the uterus, is the most prominent of these infections.