CLINICAL INVESTIGATIONS Hypnosis for pain relief in labour and childbirth: a systematic review

Methods.Medline, Embase, Pubmed, and the Cochrane library 2004.1 were searched for clinical trials where hypnosis during pregnancy and childbirth was compared with a non-hypnosis intervention, no treatment or placebo. Reference lists from retrieved papers and hypnotherapy texts were also examined. There were no language restrictions. Our primary outcome measures were labour analgesia requirements (no analgesia, opiate, or epidural use), and pain scores in labour. Suitable comparative studieswere included for further assessment according topredefinedcriteria. Meta-analyses were performed of the included randomized controlled trials (RCTs), assessed as being of ‘good’ or ‘adequate’ quality by a predefined score.