This study examined the effects of a yoga program during pregnancy, on maternal comfort, labor pain, and birth outcomes. A randomized trial was conducted using 74-primigravid Thai women who were equally divided into two groups (experimental and control). The yoga program involved six, 1-h sessions at prescribed weeks of gestation. A variety of instruments were used to assess maternal comfort, l...

background: an increasing success in induction of labor and subsequent termination of pregnancy in presence of unfavorable cervix requires cervical ripening in order to reduce complications and to diminish the rate of cesarean sections as well as the duration of labor.  however, there is no consensus on the efficiency of conventional methods for cervical ripening.   objective: to determine and ...

BACKGROUND The use of intrathecal opioids for labor analgesia continues to gain popularity, but there are limited data to guide this use. Previously, the authors established the ED50 for 60 min of labor analgesia from intrathecal sufentanil using an up-down sequential allocation study design. The current study first establishes an ED50 for intrathecal fentanyl using this same study design to es...

BACKGROUND Whether epidural analgesia for labor prolongs the active-first and second labor stages and increases the risk of vacuum-assisted delivery is a controversial topic. Our study was conducted to answer the question: does lumbar epidural analgesia with lidocaine affect the progress of labor in our obstetric population? METHOD 395 healthy, nulliparous women, at term, presented in spontan...