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Book

Breech Presentation

Caron J. Gray  1 , Meaghan M. Shanahan  2
In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2025 Jan.
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Free Books & Documents
Book

Breech Presentation

Caron J. Gray et al.
Free Books & Documents

Excerpt

Breech presentation refers to the fetus in the longitudinal lie with the buttocks or lower extremity entering the pelvis first. The 3 types of breech presentation are frank, complete, and incomplete. In a frank breech, the fetus has flexion of both hips, and the legs are straight with the feet near the fetal face, in a pike position. The complete breech has the fetus sitting with flexion of both hips and both legs in a tuck position. Finally, the incomplete breech can have any combination of 1 or both hips extended, also known as footling (one leg extended) or double footling breech (both legs extended).

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Conflict of interest statement

Disclosure: Caron Gray declares no relevant financial relationships with ineligible companies.

Disclosure: Meaghan Shanahan declares no relevant financial relationships with ineligible companies.

References

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    1. Niles KM, Barrett JFR, Ladhani NNN. Comparison of cesarean versus vaginal delivery of extremely preterm gestations in breech presentation: retrospective cohort study. J Matern Fetal Neonatal Med. 2019 Apr;32(7):1142-1147. - PubMed
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    1. Andrews S, Leeman L, Yonke N. Finding the breech: Influence of breech presentation on mode of delivery based on timing of diagnosis, attempt at external cephalic version, and provider success with version. Birth. 2017 Sep;44(3):222-229. - PubMed

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