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Risks of Cesarean Section
Risks of Cesarean Section
When a cesarean is done, the risks and benefits of the procedure need to be weighed. This includes looking at the added benefits and risks of doing a cesarean or of birthing the child vaginally. Sometimes the benefits of the cesarean will outweigh the risks, and sometime the vaginal birth benefits will outweigh the risks of the cesarean. People were asking what the additional risk of the cesarean were. I am condensing the following list from the book Mayo Clinic: Complete Book of Pregnancy & Baby's First Year. If you have any questions feel free to write me at: pregnancy.guide@about.com Robin Elise Weiss, ICCE, CD(DONA) http://pregnancy.about.com/ Cesarean birth is major surgery, and, as with other surgical procedures, risks are involved. The estimated risk of a woman dying after a cesarean birth is less than one in 2,500 (the risk of death after a vaginal birth is less than one in 10,000). These are estimated risks for a large population of women. Individual medical conditions such as some heart problems may make the risk of vaginal birth higher than cesarean birth.
In cesarean birth, the possible risks to the baby include the following:
Premature birth. If the due date was not accurately calculated, the baby could be delivered too early. Breathing problems. Babies born by cesarean are more likely to develop breathing problems such as transient tachypnea (abnormally fast breathing during the first few days after birth). Low Apgar scores. Babies born by cesarean sometimes have low Apgar scores. The low score can be an effect of the anesthesia and cesarean birth, or the baby may have been in distress to begin with. Or perhaps the baby was not stimulated as he or she would have been by vaginal birth. Fetal injury. Although rare, the surgeon can accidentally nick the baby while making the uterine incision.