The Collaborative International Dictionary
Puerperal \Pu*er"per*al\, a. [L. puerpera a lying-in woman; puer child + parere to bear: cf. F. puerp['e]ral.] Of or pertaining to childbirth; as, a puerperal fever.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Wiktionary
a. Of, pertaining to or associated with childbirth.
WordNet
adj. relating to or connected with or occurring at the time of childbirth or shortly following, or to the woman who has just given birth
Usage examples of "puerperal".
Singular, communed the guest with himself, the wonderfully unequal faculty of metempsychosis possessed by them, that the puerperal dormitory and the dissecting theatre should be the seminaries of such frivolity, that the mere acquisition of academic titles should suffice to transform in a pinch of time these votaries of levity into exemplary practitioners of an art which most men anywise eminent have esteemed the noblest.
There were also many cases of erysipelas in town at the time of the fatal puerperal cases which have been mentioned.
Series of Cases illustrating the Contagious Nature of Erysipelas and of Puerperal Fever, and their Intimate Pathological Connection.
I have never lost one, nor to the best of my recollection has one been greatly endangered, by the puerperal, miliary, low nervous, putrid malignant, or milk fever.
A general practitioner, in large midwifery practice, lost so many patients from puerperal fever, that he determined to deliver no more for some time, but that his partner should attend in his place.
A physician holding himself in readiness to attend cases of midwifery should never take any active part in the post-mortem examination of cases of puerperal fever.
If within a short period two cases of puerperal fever happen close to each other, in the practice of the same physician, the disease not existing or prevailing in the neighborhood, he would do wisely to relinquish his obstetrical practice for at least one month, and endeavor to free himself by every available means from any noxious influence he may carry about with him.
Sir Benjamin Brodie speaks of it as being well known that the inoculation of lymph or pus from the peritoneum of a puerperal patient is often attended with dangerous and even fatal symptoms.
Hey refers to two cases of synochus occurring in the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, in women who had attended upon puerperal patients.
This patient had been attacked with puerperal fever, at three of her previous confinements, but the disease yielded to depletion and other remedies without difficulty.
For I have abundant evidence that it has made many practitioners more cautious in their relations with puerperal females, and I have no doubt it will do so still, if it has a chance of being read, though it should call out a hundred counterblasts, proving to the satisfaction of their authors that it proved nothing.
No post-mortem examinations were held in any of these puerperal cases.
Puerperal Fever is so far contagious as to be frequently carried from patient to patient by physicians and nurses.
The practical point to be illustrated is the following: The disease known as Puerperal Fever is so far contagious as to be frequently carried from patient to patient by physicians and nurses.
Deaths following confinement have occurred in the practice of other physicians during the past year, but they were not cases of puerperal fever.