What is fetal monitoring during labor?
• Fetal monitoring is a good thing. It enables everyone to know how the baby is tolerating the labor. Unfortunately fetal monitoring usually means a mother lying down in the bed with a machine on her for 15 minutes of every hour. The same results can be had from a midwife, montrice, or nurse with a fetoscope or doppler. This enables mom to stay upright and mobile. Internal fetal monitors are electrodes screwed into the baby’s scalp. This enables the baby to be monitored continuously, and is generally only used after a scare with the regular monitor. Keep in mind though there is absolutely nothing this machine can tell you that a caregiver with a fetoscope or doppler can’t. This machine has a serious con, once you have the monitor on it doesn’t come off until birth. That means in bed on your back or side from then on.
