placenta and cord questions?

Question

would it be beneficial at birth to lift placenta above newborn to drain placenta and force all the newborns blood and stem cells back to the baby's body. or would the rapid and sudden influx of blood harm the newborn?
also what is hospital policy on cord clamping and does birth mother have any say on when to clamp umbilical cord.

Answer 1

The controversy dates at least to the early 1800s, some of which persists to the present day. If you strip the cord in the direction of the navel, forcing blood into the newborn, it was thought you can induce polycythemia, an excess of RBC's. The subsequent of RBC breakdown may cause jaundice in some infants.

Conversely, it was feared, if one delays clamping the cord, the infant's heart may pump some of its blood volume into the placenta, thereby developing anemia.

More recent carefully designed randomized trials have concluded that the above fears are unjustified. Actually, delayed clamping for 1 - 3 minutes results in additional blood delivered to the infant. As these infants grow, they have a lower incidence and degree of iron deficiency anemia.

Then there are the extremists who want to wait several hours to clamp and cut the cord. Personally, that's a bit much for me. But, 20 years from now, who knows?

Hospital policies vary, but you certainly have the right to make any reasonable request to your OB.

Answer 2

Definitely it will be very beneficial to drain the placenta to return the newborn's blood. That's the result of various researches so far. It is said that the placenta contain about 1/4 to 1/3 (or can be up to 1/2) of the total blood of the newborn. Lifting the placenta to drain is a good idea and NO, I believe it won't harm the newborn.However such issue still have some controversies. Few researches claims that it gives no much benefits to term neonates.

Most of the hospital policy requires waiting for few minutes to DELIVER the PLACENTA until cord PULSATION STOPS. However, there is NO CLEAR POLICY ON WHEN TO CLAMP THE CORD. As far as I can remember, hospital deliveries have the cords clamped right after the baby is delivered and are usually cut pretty quickly separating the baby from the placenta. Currently, the hospital delivery table setting is not designed to keep the baby attached to the placenta by the cord connection. And the doctors and staff needs to finish their "jobs" as fast as they could. (could be some of the reasons).

So far I haven't heard of any mother delivering saying something about the timing of the clamping of the cord.

Supposing the mother truly believes that delayed clamping will be beneficial to her newborn,it would be better to discuss it with her doctor during the prenatal visits to let her doctor know of her thoughts.(Chances are she won't remember to check on that during delivery and she won't know either when they are clamping the cord). The mother has the right on that and it can be discussed in a diplomatic way. The doctor on the other hand has no reason to deny the special request except in situation when such request puts the newborn to danger.

Well, that's what I know so far if it relates to hospital-based delivery.As long as there is no universal rule to delay cord clamping, the current practice will not easily change all through out. I am not that sure but I guess some hospital settings are now trying to delay the cord clamping.Home deliveries I know are mostly delaying the clamping of the cord.

Answer 3

The cord is usually clamped and cut before the the placenta comes out and the mother does not have a say in when it is clamped and why would you want to? If I were you, I would concentrate more on the hope that he'll get you stitched up before the feeling comes back down there. In rare cases, the doctor could save the placenta to treat another infant, provided that their tissue samples match. The infant that is given birth to will not need the excess placenta when it is born.