Obstetric Anesthesia Handbook

Handbook of Obstetric Nursing

Obstetric Regional Anesthesia

Most women experience moderate to severe pain during labor and delivery, often requiring some form of pharmacologic analgesia.1 The lack of proper psychological preparation combined with fear and anxiety can greatly enhance the patient’s sensitivity to pain and further add to the discomfort during labor and delivery. However, skillfully conducted obstetric analgesia, in addition to relieving pa...

Obstetric Anesthesia Section Editor

Very small doses of intrathecal (IT) morphine (25– 200 mg) have been used in an effort to provide effective postoperative pain relief while minimizing side effects after cesarean delivery. We performed a doubleblinded study in 40 patients presenting for elective cesarean delivery in which IT morphine was administered along with oral hydrocodone/acetaminophen and other medications commonly admin...

Practice Guidelines for Obstetric Anesthesia

1 February 2016 P RACTICE guidelines are systematically developed recommendations that assist the practitioner and patient in making decisions about health care. These recommendations may be adopted, modified, or rejected according to the clinical needs and constraints and are not intended to replace local institutional policies. In addition, practice guidelines developed by the American Societ...

Practice Guidelines for Obstetric Anesthesia

The pain of childbirth is one of the most severe types of pain a woman will endure in her lifetime. Conflicting ideas about pain relief from childbirth pain were rooted in the bible and continued throughout the middle ages and Renaissance. “In Sorrow thou shalt bring forth children” (Genesis 3:16). Fifteenth century midwives were burned at the stake for offering pain relief during labor. The mo...