Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2016 Oct 13:12:10481.
doi: 10.15766/mep_2374-8265.10481.

Emergency Obstetrics for the Emergency Medicine Provider

Maxwell Ian Cooper  1 , Dimitrios Papanagnou  2 , Mike Meguerdichian  3 , Komal Bajaj  4
Affiliations

Emergency Obstetrics for the Emergency Medicine Provider

Maxwell Ian Cooper et al. MedEdPORTAL. .

Abstract

Introduction: Emergency medicine physicians must have the knowledge and skills to stabilize all life-and-limb-threatening conditions. These skills are especially important considering that the 1989 COBRA act clearly defines active labor as a condition unsuitable to transfer. Given this context, we thought it necessary to create a work that could be used to provide emergency physicians with the necessary skills to assist in deliveries both routine and complex.

Methods: The total time requirement for the workshop is 4 hours. Before the session begins, learners are asked to fill out a survey. Learners complete two 40-minute small-group sessions on the topics of normal vaginal delivery and shoulder dystocia with hands-on training with birthing manikins. After a short break learners complete a 65-minute small-group session for breech delivery with hands-on training. Each small-group session is preceded by a whole-group demonstration of required skills lasting 15 minutes as well a mini lecture on maternal hemorrhage and estimation of blood loss.

Results: Our workshop has been shown to successfully educate emergency physicians with a range of obstetric experience and improve their knowledge base and hands-on skills. One hundred percent of our learners felt this workshop was appropriate for them and met its stated goals.

Discussion: While this is not the first workshop to educate on obstetric deliveries and their possible complications, it is the first to be created with the emergency medicine provider as the intended audience and the first to create a curriculum around uncomplicated delivery, shoulder dystocia, breech delivery, and postpartum hemorrhage.

Keywords: Breech Delivery; Emergency Medicine; Obstetrics; Postpartum Hemorrhage; Shoulder Dystocia; Simulation; Spontaneous Vaginal Delivery; Workshop.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

None to report.

References

    1. MacDorman MF, Mathews TJ, Declercq E. Trends in Out-of-Hospital Births in the United States, 1990–2012. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics; 2014. NCHS Data Brief 144. - PubMed
    1. Shoulder dystocia. Int J Gynaecol Obstet. 2003;80(1):87–92. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0020-7292(02)90001-9 - PubMed
    1. Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. Shoulder Dystocia. London, England: Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists; 2005. Green-top Guideline 42.
    1. Fruscalzo A, Londero AP, Salvador S, et al. New and old predictive factors for breech presentation: our experience in 14 433 singleton pregnancies and a literature review. J Matern Fetal Neonatal Med. 2014;27(2):167–172. http://dx.doi.org/10.3109/14767058.2013.806891 - PubMed
    1. Hickok DE, Gordon DC, Milberg JA, Williams MA, Daling JR. The frequency of breech presentation by gestational age at birth: a large population-based study. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 1992;166(3):851–852. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0002-9378(92)91347-D - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources