You ask: How much is it going to hurt? I don't want an epidural, but I'm afraid of how painful labor might be. What can you compare the pain with? I answer: I can’t tell you how much labor will hurt because the experience of pain varies from person to person and even...
You ask: I want to deliver unmedicated, and I've been planning on using pain management techniques so I won't need to get one, but everyone tells me I’ll end up getting the epidural. It's making me doubt myself. Can I get through labor without an epidural? I answer:...
If you ask most doctors and more than a few midwives whether epidurals increase cesareans, the answer will be a hard “No,” followed by, “Research evidence has shown that they don’t.” I’m here to say, “Not so fast.” I think we have equally strong evidence that they do....
Anesthesiologists have long known that accidental puncture of the dural membrane during epidural administration causes severe postpartum headache. They believed, however, that once the woman recovered, that’s the end of it. It turns out that’s not true. Evidence is...
“One of the most influential biases in the acquisition of evidence is choice of the question, and the best evidence in answer to the wrong question is useless.” Menticoglou & Hall 2002 Making the rounds on the internet is a new study finding that lying down during...
Medpage Today reports on a study contradicting the rationale for delayed pushing, or “laboring down,” with an epidural. Analysis of the hospital records of 21,000 1st-time mothers concluded that delayed pushing resulted in longer 2nd-stage duration, longer active...
EurekAlert reports on a trial finding that giving 1st-time mothers more time to push out their babies cuts the cesarean rate for prolonged second stage in half. The American College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists’ sets the threshold for prolonged second stage in...
According to a study soon to be published in Birth, epidural fentanyl and IV oxytocin have dose-dependent negative effects on instinctive newborn ability to suckle. Investigators blinded to whether women had epidurals, IV oxytocin, or both evaluated videos of 63...
The first in Henci’s new Take Charge of Your Birth Series, Labor Pain: What’s Your Best Strategy? delivers up-to-date access to the best medical research plus practical strategies for developing your plan and putting it into action. Also available in audiobook.
