In nature, when a laboring animal feels threatened or disturbed, the stress hormone catecholamine shuts down labor. Similarly, when a laboring woman does not feel safe or protected or when the progress of her normal labor is altered, catecholamine levels rise and labor slows down or stops. This column discusses the importance of providing labor support that respects the woman's privacy, protect...

Neglected obstructed labor is a major cause of feto-maternal morbidity and mortality in the developing countries [1-3]. Labor is obstructed when the presenting part of the fetus cannot progress into the birth canal despite strong uterine contractions [4]. It becomes neglected obstructed labor when the obstruction is not relieved for several hours or days. Labor that is not supervised by skilled...

Despite the frequency with which obstetrics providers manage labor, evidence has emerged in the past few years challenging our historical understanding of normal labor progress over time. We are also confronted with the dearth of evidence to guide the optimal management of labor. With these data, we are presented with both the challenge of changing practice at the bedside and the opportunity fo...

OBJECTIVE Our purpose was to test the hypothesis that progress of labor slows as parity exceeds 4 by comparing labor curves of grand multiparous women (para 5 and over) (GMs) with those of nulliparous and lower-parity multiparous women. STUDY DESIGN Retrospective cohorts of spontaneously laboring, vertex-presenting, term GMs who were admitted to two medical centers during the period from Janu...

Technological change is a distinctive characteristic of modern labor markets. New technologies change the demand for different skills in the labor market and thus introduce uncertainty in the wage structure that agents will face in the future. In this way, technological change affects agents decisions about which skills to invest in. In this paper, I study how labor market uncertainty arising f...

This paper shows that the development from an agricultural regime through industrialization to a manufacturing regime occurs simultaneously to the demographic transition and the change in labor structure towards an increasing fraction of skilled labor due to technological progress. The manufacturing sector is economically viable when the technological level is sufficiently high. During the indu...

Our objective is to study, in a labor market characterized by search frictions, the effects of technological progress on the average quality of the job matches. We will see as results that the effects of technological progress on the labor market depend upon the initial conditions of the economy. If the economy is totally characterized by the presence of low-quality job matches, an increase in ...

Physiologists have shown that increased fluids improve skeletal muscle performance in prolonged exercise.Typical orders provide for 125 mL of intravenous fluids per hour in patients taking limited oral fluids during labor. Our purpose in this study was to determine whether increased intravenous fluids affect the progress of labor. In a prospective randomized institutional clinical trial, on...

Background: Saffron is a perennial plant native to Iran which has been traditionally prescribed to facilitate labor. We aimed to investigate the effect of Crocus sativus (Saffron) on cervical ripening and progress of labor in a sample of primiparous term Iranian women. Materials and Methods: </stro...