How effective is the pain relief from an epidural?
With an epidural pain messages are blocked from traveling up the spinal cord to the brain.And since it is the brain that enables you to sense pain in your body, with an epidural you are unable to sense the pain of labor making pain relief very effective. The other approach to treating labor pain is to give pain medication into your bloodstream by injecting the medication through your IV.Medication given this way cannot block pain messages from reaching your brain.It can only blunt the perception of pain in the brain.Therefore, it is not very effective in treating the pain of labor when compared to an epidural.That said, there are instances when you may still feel the pain of labor after getting an epidural.Should this happen every effort will be made to make you comfortable.The following are reasons why labor may still hurt after you get an epidural: You may need more medication The standard dose of medication that is given will provide pain relief in most women.However, certain women
