Myth busting #1: There is no alternative to the CTG
There really is an alternative to CTG use…
EFM
Electronic fetal monitoring
Does CTG monitoring work for women with risk factors?
Today’s post shares the back story behind our paper. #CTG #EFM #PerinatalMortality #CP
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Dawes Redman system
A student in my Fetal Monitoring for Maternity Professionals course asked me about this recently – and I realised I had never written about it, despite having promised to do so a few times! This is for Natalie, with gratitude. What is the Dawes Redman system? As an Australia maternity care provider, I have never encountered the Dawes Redman system in clinical practice. Its use seems to be widespread in […]
When is CTG use in labour a good idea?
Fetal monitoring guidelines around the world recommend CTG use in labour when women are considered to be a higher risk for a bad outcome for the baby that is linked to low oxygen levels in labour. Regular readers of my blog will have seen me write repeatedly about the lack of great evidence to back this up. There’s no compelling research showing better outcomes with CTG use for women planning […]
Words have power
Words have power. I know this – the approach I used for my doctoral research requires you to look closely at how language shapes the social world. If you have hung around the birth world for a bit, you have probably made some conscious choices about whether you use the words “patient” and “delivery”. I spend most of my working week choosing which words work best to get the job […]
Does counting each baby save babies lives?
Why did the Each Baby Counts program not made a difference?
Fetal monitoring and cord clamping: What’s the link?
Professor Susan Bewley is a professor of obstetrics with an interest in a great many things. I first became aware of her work many years ago, when I saw her writing about the potential links between the timing of cord clamping, cord blood pH testing, fetal monitoring methods, and perinatal outcomes. Susan recently challenged me to summarise the issues in a blog post – so here we go! Setting the […]
Comparing continuous CTG use with intermittent CTG use
In some settings, women are offered the option of having intermittent CTG use rather than continuous CTG use. This might look something like having 20 to 30 minutes of CTG use every hour or two, with intermittent auscultation used during the time off the CTG. A first look, this seems like it might be a way to reduce some of the downsides associated with CTG use (like the increased rate […]
Tending to the machine: Women’s experiences of fetal monitoring in labour
Last week I posted about a literature review that summarised 47 years of research about women’s experiences of labour. The same research team responsible for that paper, has also just recently published new Australian research (Fox et al., 2024) describing women’s current experiences with fetal monitoring in labour. The paper has been published in an open access journal, so you are able to read the full paper yourself. If you […]
Birth Small Talk 