Effects of Digital Vaginal Examination During Labor on Pain and Anxiety Levels

Ankara University40 enrolled

Overview

Digital vaginal examination is the most common method for assessing progress of labor and delivery. Considering it is the most common intervention women receive during course of labor, evidence for psychological effects of digital vaginal examination on women is surprisingly sparse. Reducing the number of vaginal examination during labor has been proposed by many authors as benefit of more vaginal examination is unclear. However this is unlikely to happen until more research on the topic demonstrates clear detrimental effects of vaginal examination. Our study is aimed at investigating association of vaginal examination with psychological distress of women during labor. Anxiety during labor is associated with longer labor duration, increased perception of pain, problems with newborn attachment, and increased rates of postpartum depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. In this study, women were assigned to either digital vaginal examination or transperineal ultrasound assessment groups were compared to each other in a randomised controlled setting.

Study Type

INTERVENTIONAL

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Masking

SINGLE

Enrollment

Conditions

Pregnancy Obstetric Labor

Interventions

Patients will be subject to digital vaginal examinations every four hours during latent phase of first stage, hourly during active phase of first stage and as needed during second stage.

Transperineal ultrasound examinationDEVICE

Patients will be subject to transperineal ultrasound examinations every four hours during latent phase of first stage, hourly during active phase of first stage and as needed during second stage.

Eligibility

Sex: FEMALEMin age: 18 YearsHealthy volunteers:

Medical Language ↔ Plain English

Inclusion Criteria: * Multiparous women * Spontaneous active labor * Cephalic presentation Exclusion Criteria: * Women with known psychiatric disorders * Labor induction * Advanced labor during admission (Dilatation greater than 7cm) * Presence of a prenatally diagnosed anomaly in fetus * Admission to neonatal intensive care unit after delivery * Delayed hospital discharge due to excessive weight loss of neonate

Locations (1)

Ankara University Faculty of Medicine, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology

Ankara, Turkey (Türkiye)

RECRUITING

Outcomes

Primary Outcomes

Anxiety levels

Anxiety levels of the patients will be assessed with the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) questionnaire during admission, at the beginning of active phase of stage one and four hours after delivery.

Time frame: Between 12 to 48 hours

Labor pain

Perceived pain level of the patients will be assessed with Visual Analog Scale (VAS) questionnaire during admission, at the beginning of active phase of stage one and four hours after delivery.

Time frame: Between 12 to 48 hours

Central Contacts

Erkan Kalafat, MD

CONTACT

05334736998 ekalafat@ankara.edu.tr

Data from ClinicalTrials.gov

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