Pain Management Options During Labour & Childbirth

Find out what your options are when it comes to alleviating labour pain.

Systemic Analgesics
Analgesics work by depressing the nervous system and lessening (but doesn't completely eliminate) the sensation of pain. Analgesics can cause some side-effects for the mother, such as drowsiness and nausea. They are administered as an injection, and when used at the right point in labour will not cause any serious side effects. However, if it is administered too late in labour, the baby may become sluggish. Common analgesic drugs used to relive labour pain include the narcotics meperidine (Demerol), nalbuphine (Nubain), butorphanol (Stadol) and fentanyl (Sublimaze).
Tranquilizers
While tranquilizers don't provide pain relief, they are used to help calm and relax extremely anxious mothers and are sometimes used in conjunction with analgesics.
Regional Anesthesia
Regional anesthetics numb or deaden sensation, and therefore pain, completely in a specific portion of the body. Epidurals and blocks are common forms of local anesthesia used to provide pain relief to the entire body below the belly button. Because epidurals remove sensation and pain, they tend to slow down labour and make it more difficult for the mother to push the baby out.

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