Pain relief during delivery. An evaluation of conventional methods.

The study evaluates the effect of conventional obstetric analgesia on 544 parturients and their newborn infants. The parturients' pain situation was evaluated with respect to both the effect of pain relief given, and the total pain experience in the first and second stage. This gave a more correct view of the parturients' pain situation and effectiveness of the analgesic procedures that if one or the other estimation was used separately. Nearly 20% of all parturients experienced good effect on low-back or suprapubic pain in the first stage. Severe to almost unbearable pain was experienced by about 60% of all parturients in the first stage as well as in the second stage. The duration of labor showed a strong positive correlation (p less than 0.0001) to the pain intensity in the first stage and a strong negative correlation (p less than 0.0001) to the degree of cervical dilation at admission. No adverse effects on the newborn infants were seen, apart from the well-known association between the drug--delivery interval and the slightly depressant effects of pethidine.