Throughout the labor and birth, a midwife or trained health care provider will monitor and interpret your baby’s heart rate or heartbeats using tools; any change in the rate may not be a good sign. The fetal heart patterns during labor help the doctor to decide whether to intervene in the birth process. Changes in your baby’s heart rate during labor can be a sign that your baby is not getting sufficient oxygen, which the doctors call fetal distress.
Hands-On-Listening or Intermittent Auscultation
If your pregnancy is healthy and normal and if you are well, your midwife will press an ear trumpet, often called a Pinard horn or Doppler ultrasound monitor, to the abdomen. Then she will listen to the heartbeats of your baby, and she will keep doing these checks every 15 to 30 minutes for short periods during your labor and birthing process. Her duty includes documenting the acceleration, depth, and acceleration of heart rates of your unborn child. Among several types of devices, that health care providers use, the handheld fetal Doppler ultrasound device is the most popular in the United States. Other options for hands-on-listening include the Pinard fetal stethoscope, the DeLee fetal stethoscope, the Cascade Allen Type fetal stethoscope, and the Leff fetal stethoscope.
Continuous External Fetal Monitoring
An electronic monitor attached to a belt around your abdomen will constantly record the heartbeats of your unborn child and your contractions on a paper printout, and some monitors may restrict your movements. Your doctor may advise you on continuous EFM if you have risks of complications. And if he/she advises you on continuous monitoring, you will need one that lets you move around.
Internal Fetal Monitoring
In case of having a problem with external monitoring, low quality of the recording, or twin pregnancy, your doctor will advise you on internal fetal monitoring instead. An expert will place an electrode (attached with an electronic monitor) on the scalp of your unborn baby through your cervix. The test will evaluate the heart rate and variability between beats of the fetus inside your womb, particularly in relation to your uterine contraction of labor. If you are HIV positive or hepatitis C positive, your doctor will not advise you of internal fetal monitoring. This monitoring would be the same for maternidad subrogada or surrogacy parenthood.
Fetal Scalp Blood Sampling
There is a special type of kit manufactured by the medical instruments manufacturers and suppliers containing a few small and handy instruments in there, including a pin to prick. After a few preoperational steps, an expert will prick the scalp of your unborn child using the pin to take a few drops of blood. This monitoring will provide your doctor a report about the condition of your baby in labor within the fastest possible time. When your doctor will require more information than continuous external fetal monitoring provides, only then he or she will recommend this test. In some cases, doctors need to repeat this test. The report of the test clearly states whether the doctor needs to start the birthing process to deliver the baby without any delay or not.
The above facts are the proofs, backgrounds, and potential improvements of various types of fetal monitoring. Since the 1970s, with the introduction of electronic fetal monitoring, the rates of child death during birth and stillbirth have been reducing to a great extent around the world. Contact your midwife or doctor when the time of your labor approaches. All 4 types of fetal monitoring are very useful to the doctors and specialists to help women enjoy the finishing lines of their pregnancy successfully.