Use of pharmacological and non-pharmacological labour pain management techniques and their relationship to maternal and infant birth outcomes: Examination of a nationally representative sample of 1835 pregnant women.

Aim: women use various labour pain management techniques during birth. The objective of this study is to investigate women's use of pharmacological and non-pharmacological labour pain management techniques in relation to birth outcomes. Methods: a sub-survey of a nationally representative sample of pregnant women (n=1835) from the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health. Results: our analysis identified women's use of water for labour pain management as decreasing the likelihood of their baby being admitted to special care nursery (OR=0.42, p<0.004) whereas the use of epidural increased this likelihood (OR=3.38, p<0.001) as well as for instrumental childbirth (OR=7.27, p<0.001). Epidural and pethidine use decreased women's likelihood of continuing breast-feeding (ORs=0.68 and 0.59, respectively, both p<0.01) whereas the use of breathing techniques and massage for pain control increased the likelihood of women continuing breast-feeding (ORs=1.72 and 1.62, respectively, both p<0.01). Conclusions: our study illustrates associations between the use of both pharmacological and nonpharmacological labour pain management techniques and selected birth outcomes while controlling for confounding variables. There remain significant gaps in the evidence base for the use of nonpharmacological labour pain control methods and our findings provide a platform with which to develop a broad clinical research programme around this topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]