One of the questions I am often asked about is what research says is the best approach to fetal heart rate monitoring for a woman who has previously had one (or possibly more) caesarean births in the past and plans a vaginal birth this time around. There is no simple answer to this question, so it is one I have avoided writing about. Up until now. A new piece of […]
The problem with guidelines is not that they exist nor that they play a role in structuring good practice. The problem is when guidelines over-reach their purpose.
Myself and my co-authors have a new paper, freshly published with Women and Birth (available here). One of the questions I asked while generating data from my doctoral research was – who made the decision about the approach to fetal heart rate monitoring that any individual woman would use during her labour? At first glance, the answer seemed to be that no one was actively making decisions. I didn’t interview […]
Whose fault is it when we can’t agree on the CTG? #EFM #CTG #CTGInterpretation #CentralFetalMonitoring
We expect that evidence based guidelines are written by people who can critically review and use evidence. Sometimes that’s not what happens though. Here’s an example….
Medical indications exist somewhere on a spectrum between being written on tablets of stone, handed down to new doctors by a supreme being on a mountain top – to being completely made up on a whim. What happens when they are misused?
We don’t actually know which fetal heart rate patterns predict developing brain injury. Why?
Fetal monitoring guidelines should be evidence-based and assessed to ensure they are fit for purpose.
Which fetal monitoring guideline is the best one to use?
The history of maternity care is littered with stories of half-baked science that becomes embedded in practice and only too late is discovered to be ineffective and challenging to step away from.
Birth Small Talk 