Analysis Of Internal And External Fetal Heart Rate (FHR) Monitoring Patterns And Their Predictive Value For Fetal Prognosis During The Second Stage Of Labor

Purposes: To investigate the difference in degrees of satisfaction of FUR tracings between the internal and external FUR monitoring during the second stage of labor and to evaluate intrapartum application value of the internal FUR monitoring. Methods: 237 primiparas with singleton term pregnancy, and without contraindications for vaginal delivery were investigated. Internal and external FUR monitoring were carried out simultaneously during the second stage of labor. Differences between the two groups were calculated using the Mann-Whitney U Test. Results: 203 were performed by Internal and external monitoring simultaneously and the other 34 only by external monitoring owing to contraindications for the scalp spiral electrode. There was a significant difference in degrees of satisfaction of FUR tracings between the internal and external monitoring group (U=20 12, ThO.000). Conclusions 1. The external monitoring is a simple, convenient method for repeated and continuous monitoring. But it is defective when used in the second stage because of its higher incidence of unsatisfactory or false FHR tracings. 2. The internal monitoring is superior to the external and it can predict the fetal status in the uterus reliably.