Dear Lactnetters: Has anyone who works in a NICU had any dealing with mastitis & cultured freshly expressed breastmilk growing the organism strep agalactiae (group B) ? In our Intensive Care Nursery we have a set of 33 wk twin girls who as of last Wed. were 13 days old & doing well. Mom has been doing well with pumping. MOM called me last Wed. morning with classic symptoms of a breast infection: fever 101, achy, & very tender breast. OB called & antibiotics started. Around midday twin B took a turn for the worst & went into NEC (necrotizing enterocolitis). The neonatologist felt the coincidence of the NEC & fever/mastitis was enough to take Twin A off EBM & place npo. She also said to discard the thawed milk they were getting. Then she wanted a culture of the EBM. None was thawed at this time. When Mom came in we had her pump & cultured her fresh milk. Group B strep grew but no WBC's. Later we realized that the milk the babies were receiving was 4-5 days older not the most current pumped. The DR didn't want us to thaw that & get a culture. That would have been a truer picture of what the babies were receiving (plan to check with the infection control nurse on Monday about getting it cultured). Has anyone had Group B culture out of EBM? Could this be in the milk or in the equipment? The baby went into full-blown NEC, had surgery but did not survive. I'm also concerned that the DR may have planted the seed of guilt in the Mom that her milk may have caused this. If anyone can shed any help on this I'd appreciate it. TIA, Debbie Moses, RN, IBCLC Louisville, KY hospital based LC