Brigham & Women’s To Offer Laughing Gas To Laboring Moms

BOSTON (CBS) – Soon there will be another option to relieve the pain of childbirth at one local hospital. It’s not a new pain medication, but it’s a gas that’s been around a long time and is now making resurgence. Laughing gas or nitrous oxide. It’s been used for decades for labor pain all over the world but not here in the U.S. for a while. “Over the last five years, there’s been a big push by childbirth providers in the United States to reintroduce the use of nitrous oxide,” says Dr. Bill Camann, the Chief of Obstetric Anesthesiology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “It doesn’t provide the same kind of pain relief as an epidural but it will take the edge off things,” he explains. It’s great for patients early in labor before they get an epidural, for patients who don’t want an epidural, or for patients who are too close to delivery to get an epidural. And the effects are quick. “It’s very short-acting,” says Dr. Camann. “You take a breath and it works within a few seconds, but within a few breaths it goes away,” he adds. Ideally a patient would take a few breaths of this earlier before her contraction or at the beginning of her contraction so the medicine has the maximal effect when she’s feeling the most pain. “It’s non-invasive. It’s very safe. It has little to no effect on the baby,” says Kate McGovern, a Labor and Delivery Nurse at the Brigham who he...
Source: WBZ-TV - Breaking News, Weather and Sports for Boston, Worcester and New Hampshire - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Health Local News Seen On WBZ-TV Syndicated Local Watch Listen Brigham & Women's Hospital Dr. Bill Camann Dr. Mallika Marshall laughing gas Pregnancy Source Type: news