By now all of us would be familiar with assisted form of delivery which includes forceps delivery. Let us cast our mind back to a suction cup baby delivery referred to as ventouse.
The reasons for assistance?
With an assisted form of delivery the doctor or midwife would need the help of some form of instrument for the baby to make way via birth canal. This could be needed in the second stage of labor it if comes to a standstill. You face contractions and are pushing, the head of your baby has descended and the cervix becomes dilated. But both the mother along with the baby is precedingnowhere. A vacuum cup delivery may be needed, if heartbeat of a baby is not regular and delivery needs to happen on an immediate basis.
The doctor chooses a vacuum assisted delivery rather than forceps because of their personal preference. In US both the type of methods are not put to use. Forceps accounts for less than 1% of births whereas in case of vacuum extraction it is less than 2 %. Both these methods have witnessed a declining curve in the last few years.
Both these methods have lost their sheen ever since C section delivery has evolved. At a certain point of time forceps was the only method for delivery if labor had stalled. Though this methodwas considered to be risky because of blood transfusions or use of sterile equipment. Mostly this method was tried when the mother had gone on to die during childbirth. With this method the only hope was to save the child.
The moment a vacuum assisted birth is suggested the doctor would discuss the situation with a patient. The doctor would reach out to the birth canal, and on the baby’s head a small suction cup would be placed. You link it to a small hand pump which incorporates a vacuum in the cup that is attached to the scalp of the baby. The health care provider can put some traction on the baby during pushing.
The risks
Some of the probable risks would include a scrap or wound and it could be a temporary swelling where the suction cup was attached. The swelling would go on to fade in a couple of days. Any serious type of injury from this delivery method is rare.
One of the risks from this surgery would mean the tearing of your vagina. Once delivery is over you might be facing trouble in emptying your bladder or short term difficulty to urinate. These complications could even occur with vaginal birth, but with vacuum extraction risk does increase at a considerable level. If you are a victim of episiotomy, infection or excess bleeding is witnessed.
It is suggested that you discuss with your doctor with any assisted type of delivery well in advance. Do ask them which method they are going to use and why one method is preferred over the other.
