Painless Delivery: Procedure, Advantages and Risks

You can achieve painless delivery with a kind of regional anaesthesia that offers pain relief during vaginal delivery. Epidural anaesthesia is a kind of drug that’s administered using an injection in the mother’s lower back. The drug needs 10-15 minutes to be effective. This method is recommended for women who can’t bear much pain and who would else go for caesarean delivery. 

If you wish to opt for this procedure, consult a reputed gynaecologist in Pune to know its pros and cons and whether you’re a good candidate for it. 

Here’s all you need to know about the procedure, advantages and risks of painless delivery. 

Procedure

You may be asked to sit still while arching your back while you receive the epidural. Your lower back will be catheterised by inserting a thin tube into your spinal cord’s lower part. The doctor removes the needle and tapes the catheter into place to administer epidural anaesthesia during labour. This is done during active labour and involves numbing the pelvic region and the area below it as you stay conscious. Nevertheless, you must remember that this method doesn’t ensure 100% pain relief. A gynaecologist in Pune can tell you about this procedure in further detail. 

Advantages 

• Painless delivery offers women a chance to have natural childbirth with minimal intervention. It has helped bring down the number of volunteered cesarean deliveries in India. 
• Women who easily get exhausted from pushing or have a low pain threshold can still have natural childbirth by taking an epidural. Those who wish to avoid a C-section can also opt for this method. 
• By relieving pain, this method helps the mother concentrate on her delivery. It can help her relax and prevent irritation and exhaustion that’s usually undergone during childbirth. This reduces the risk of post-partum complications. 
• Painless delivery helps the baby go down easily by relaxing your vaginal and pelvic muscles. 
• This method also helps lower the mother’s blood pressure, which else can spike up to risky levels during childbirth. 

Side Effects or Risks 

• Although the epidural is fully safe for the mother and her baby, you may get side effects like shivering, back pain, dizziness, nausea, breathing problems and fever. 
• The new mother may go through extreme migraine-like headaches because of some leakage of the epidural into her spine. 
• The labour may need more time than when an epidural is not used. 
• The mother may have difficulty passing urine after delivery. A catheter might be used in this case. 
• Painless delivery causes numbness of the whole lower body and you’ll usually need a while before being able to walk. 
• If the mother’s blood pressure falls in stray cases, the heart rate of the baby may also go down. An emergency C-section may be required in extreme cases. 

Delivery with an epidural has helped several women in having a successful vaginal birth. If you consider going for this procedure, make sure to speak to a gynaecologist in Pune to know if the method is a good option for you.