Fewer than 1% of women had ‘practically perfect births' in two-year study

By Gordon Deegan

A new study by Irish medics has found that the rate of ‘practically perfect births' amongst over 7,600 births surveyed over a two-year period is less than 1%.

In a new paper in the May edition of the Irish Medical Journal (IMJ), the medics found that out of a large cohort of 7,616 mothers who gave birth at at the National Maternity Hospital, only 0.8% had a practically perfect birth.

The authors of the study describe the result of its study as “astonishing”.

They state: “Importantly, the question following this research must be asked; would imparting this information to first-time mothers evoke fear of labour or provide realistic expectations?”

The authors state that while there is a poor chance of a “practically perfect birth”, neonatal outcomes remain positive”.

The paper entitled ‘How would Mary Poppins fare in labour? Practically perfect? Unlikely.’ states that “unrealistic expectations of labour in first-time mothers can present challenges to physicians and midwives”.

The authors define a perfect birth as labour without intervention, an intact perineum and a positive neonatal outcome.

The study states that with the increasing influence of social media, there is the potential for women to feel pressure to have the ‘perfect’ birth.

The authors state that the the study should provide useful statistics for providing realistic expectations for first-time mothers.

On the 7,616 women at the National Maternity Hospital surveyed who delivered after 37 weeks during 2014 and 2015, 4,171 went into spontaneous labour, while 2,753 were induced with the remaining 692 having a caesarean section as a primary procedure.

The study found that 2,111 had an artificial rupture of membranes in labour and 857 received oxytocin.

After excluding these, there were 1,203 remaining and 172 women had a fetal blood sample taken, leaving 1,031.

The study found that of the 1,031 women who had a spontaneous labour without any of the interventions mentioned, 57 had an emergency caesarean section, 86 had a ventouse delivery, 33 had a forceps delivery, two were spontaneous breech deliveries and 5 were born before arrival to hospital.

This left 848 practically perfect births, but the authors then looked at the perineal outcome and all tears and episiotomies.

This found that 579 mothers sustained tears with an additional 201 sustaining episiotomies.

This left 68 with an intact perineum with the authors finding that 66 or 0.8% of the 7,616 mothers had the perfect birth.