Over the past 2 years, I am increasingly hearing the diagnosis “oligohydramnios” or “low amniotic fluid” as one of the biggest reasons for induction and/or C-Section. How do we “diagnose” low amniotic fluid? How much is too little? Do we need repeated Ultrasound Scans to determine the level of fluid? What about traditional hands-on skills [...]
As we at Healthy Mother are waiting for many of our babies to be born, I seem to be repeating the similar encouragements during each mother’s antenatal visit “it is okay to wait”; “your baby knows when she is ready”…… most mommies are tired of waiting; their “due date” has come and gone; and even [...]
This blog is inspired by a conversation I had with a mom a couple of days ago. She said that she had been induced 8 times in a 24 hour period! When her labor did not pick up as expected, she was given the option of getting induced again the next day after a few [...]
Today in our Lamaze class, we were discussing about the various interventions that are now a common part of most hospital procedures when a mother is admitted in labor. So, we talked about induction and augmentation, we talked about the pros and cons of amniotomy, episiotomy and other pain relief medications in labor. One of [...]
The Times of India Hyderabad on 21/1 carried an editorial titled “Take it Easy” on a World Health Organization report on rising c-section rates in Asian countries, including India. While the WHO report mentions that in India overall, the c-section rate is 18%, in reality, if we take the urban and semi-urban population into consideration, [...]
December 19th, 2008: I had known this mom since her 4th month of pregnancy. She had joined one of our antenatal programs early, since she knew she would be traveling to her hometown of Assam, in northeastern India within the next couple of months and would remain there for her delivery. However, the very next [...]