Fear of Childbirth Linked to Longer Labor, Study Says

HealthDay – 31 mins ago WEDNESDAY, June 27 (HealthDay News) -- Women who are afraid to give birth tend to have longer labor than women who are more relaxed about the process, new research suggests.

Researchers in Norway found women fearful of giving birth spent about an hour and a half longer in labor than other women (about eight hours compared to six and a half hours).

Fear of giving birth was also associated with a greater likelihood of an instrumental vaginal delivery or an emergency Cesarean section.

The study was published June 27 in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology.

Researchers surveyed more than 2,200 women pregnant women, about half of whom were going to be first-time mothers, about their attitudes toward childbirth. About 7.5 percent of the women were afraid of childbirth.

Even after taking other factors into account that could prolong labor, such as epidural anesthesia and labor induction, labor for the women who feared childbirth was longer than for more relaxed women.

But, the study authors pointed out that even though women who feared childbirth labored longer, 89 percent managed to deliver vaginally, compared to 93 percent of women who did not fear giving birth.

"Fear of childbirth seems to be an increasingly important issue in obstetric care," study co-author Samantha Salvesen Adams, of Akershus University Hospital, said in a journal news release.

"We found a link between fear of childbirth and longer duration of labor," Adams said. "Generally, longer labor duration increases the risk of instrumental vaginal delivery and emergency caesarean section. However, it is important to note that a large proportion of women with a fear of childbirth successfully had a vaginal delivery and therefore elective Cesarean delivery should not be routinely recommended."

Experts note that while this study found an association between fear of childbirth and longer labor, it didn't prove that anxiety about giving birth caused the longer labors.

More information

The U.S. National Institutes of Health provides more information on childbirth.

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U.S. Women in Labor Longer Than They Were 50 Years Ago

HealthDay – 1 hr 46 mins ago FRIDAY, March 30 (HealthDay News) -- American women today are spending about two hours more in labor during childbirth than women did 50 years ago, a new report says.

The report's authors said several factors helped to explain the longer labors.

"Older maternal age and increased BMI (body-mass index, a ratio of weight to height) accounted for a part of the increase. We believe that some aspects of delivery-room practice are also responsible for this increase," lead author Dr. Katherine Laughon, an epidemiologist with the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, said during a Friday afternoon news conference.

For the study, Laughon's team collected data on nearly 40,000 women who gave birth between 1959 and 1966, and compared those findings with nearly 100,000 women who delivered between 2002 and 2008.

The researchers found women in the 21st century were in labor 2.6 hours longer for first births and two hours longer for subsequent births than women from the 1960s.

Mothers in the 2000s also were older, heavier and used painkillers more during labor, and were more likely to have a Cesarean delivery than women in the 1960s.

Other differences that might explain the increase reflect changes in later-stage delivery practices. For instance, in the 1960s the use of episiotomy (a surgical incision to enlarge the vaginal opening during delivery) and forceps (surgical instruments used to extract a baby) were more common, the researchers noted.

The use of epidural injections to ease the pain of delivery is more common now than 50 years ago. Epidurals were used in more than half of recent deliveries, compared with 4 percent of deliveries in the 1960s, the study authors said, adding that epidural anesthesia is known to increase delivery time.

The study also found that Cesarean deliveries are four times more common today than 50 years ago -- 12 percent vs. 3 percent.

"Women are in labor longer

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