Comparison between Water Birth and Land Birth in Terms of Delivery Duration, Labor, Need to Drug, Birthing and Neonatal Outcomes.

Background: Water birth is one of the assisted methods of natural childbirth that helps mothers to feel less pain and pressure during childbirth. The aim of this study is, to evaluate the efficacy of water birth on delivery duration and need to drug compared with conventional delivery. Materials and Methods: This randomized clinical trial was performed on pregnant women aged 15-40 yrs. with gestational age >37 weeks at Mashhad Omolbanin hospital. The women were randomly divided into 2 groups of 100 in conventional delivery and 100 in water birth delivery group. Delivery duration at different stages of labor and need to drug were compared between two groups using T-student, Chi-square, and Fisher Exact tests. P≤0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: Mean duration of first stage of labor, second stage of labor and third stage of labor were not statistically different between two groups (P>0.05). The need to strengthen labor contractions with oxytocin was 8.4% in water birth delivery group and 9.23% in conventional delivery group; the difference was statistically significant (P=0.02). Also, need to different types of narcotics were significantly higher in conventional delivery group than in water birth delivery group. Conclusion: Water birth reduces labor pain and reduces medical interventions and prescribes narcotics by strengthening labor contractions. Introducing this method in the future can be a good alternative to normal delivery by reducing cesarean section. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]