1b – Pain-Free Birth
Side Effect of Epidural Anesthesia: Rare but Real!
In my 12plus years of doula career, I have seen many clients get an epidural, usually as a last resort. Being exhausted and with no relief in sight… It was a life saver for them. It happens to many (too many) women in labor (Why? is a different story and I will need another blog for just that topic…).
As a hypnotist, I know the power of the mind and I also believe that “Thoughts create Reality”. So, I hesitated to even post all the possible side effects, some permanent in very rare cases. But the truth needs to be accessible so that you are making INFORMED decision when it comes to your body, your health and your baby’s health!
So here is just a simple list (adapted from see source below):
1 ) Significant Low Blood Pressure
2 ) Fetal Distress
3 ) Cannulation
4 ) Trauma to Blood Vessel
5 ) Puncture Dura
6 ) Infection
7 ) Bach ache
8 ) Broken Catheters
9 ) Abnormal Uterine Contractions
10) Increased use of forceps and vacuum extraction in second stage
11) Inadequate pain relief ( For 7.1 % of women, it doesn’t work!)
12) Accidental Spinal Anesthesia
13) Maternal Heart Attack
14) If you have asthma, it can get worse during labor
15) Medication interaction i.e. with the prostaglandin gel used in some cases to induce labor
16) If you had migraine, that can get worse
17) Interactions with other illnesses
18) Fever and Malignant Hyperthermia
19) Respiratory Arrests (you stop breathing because your diaphragm is numb)
20) Neurological Disabilities
21) Nausea (30% of women)
22) Vomiting (3-7% of women)
23) Allergic conditions may worsen
24) Heart problems
25) Headache
26) Temporary paralysis
27) Recurrence of Herpes Simplex (if you had it in the past, it could flare up again!)
28) Permanent Disability
29) Death
It is a balancing act to get information and than decide what is best for you and your baby. Get you partner involved, so he too knows the “inside story” and can advocate for you when you are staying focused during labor and connected with your inner work and your baby. Once your decision is made, make total peace with it, because that is what is most important after all!
Let me know… Was it useful to you? Did it help you decide? Or Would you rather not have known?
P.S.: In my “Quantum Birthing” hypno-program for childbirth, I teach a simple technique called clearing the “Library of Record” to help erase or cancel the negative beliefs and information not in alignment with your blissful, undisturbed, normal birth!
Source: Medical Risks of Epidural Anesthesia during Childbirth by Lewis Mehl-Madrona, MD, PhD and Morgaine Mehl-Madrona, midwife.
You might also like: Is Epidural a Safe Way to Have Pain Free Childbirth?
Continue reading Side Effect of Epidural Anesthesia: Rare but Real!
Is Epidural a Safe Way to Have Pain Free Childbirth?
I have read on other “mom and baby” blogs comments like: ” For pain free birth get an epidural!”. My epidural was the best thing ever, I was rested and did not feel a thing.” That is until the effect wears off, mind you! I know, epidural anesthesia can be a life saver but do you really know the risk you and your baby are taking?
Epidural Anesthesia: so common we seem to forget its risks!
They say: “Women are almost never given informed consent for epidurals. Even if they were, just read two paragraphs from the package insert that comes with the medication used for epidurals (manufactured by Abbott Laboratories), they might think twice.”
The package insert states:
Local anesthetics rapidly cross the placenta, and when used for epidural, caudal or pudendal anesthesia, can cause varying degrees of maternal, fetal and neonatal toxicity….
Adverse reactions in the parturient, fetus and neonate involve alternations of the central nervous system, peripheral vascular tone and cardiac function….
Neurologic effects following epidural or caudal anesthesia may include spinal block of varying magnitude (including high or total spinal block); hypotension secondary to spinal block; urinary retention; fecal and urinary incontinence; loss of perineal sensation and sexual function; persistent anesthesia, paresthesia, weakness, paralysis of the lower extremities and loss of sphincter control all of which may have slow, incomplete or no recovery; headache; backache; septic meningitis; meningismus; slowing of labor; increased incidence of forceps delivery; cranial nerve palsies due to traction on nerves from loss of cerebrospinal fluid.
Would you sign a consent for an epidural if it included the above language? The Mehl-Madrona also state: “The degree to which the facts about the risks of epidural anesthesia are hidden from women in labor is astonishing”. And I agree. What happened to “informed consent”!
Would you do it now that you have read the “insert”? Would you do it again? What do you think?
Let’s share…
source: Medical Risk of Epidural Anesthesia during Childbirth
Continue reading Is Epidural a Safe Way to Have Pain Free Childbirth?
