What Are Epidural Side Effects?
Worried about epidural side effects, but still interested in using it for labor pain? Wondering whether the risks are worth the benefits?
Though most of these side effects are minor, and occur rarely, there may be some that are still not acceptable to you.
As with all your decisions concerning your birth, you should determine what is important to you about your childbirth experience, and do some serious research about your options. Read lots of birth stories and watch some birth videos, attend childbirth classes in real life or online, and then make a decision that is right for you.
Here's the good news: if you decide to use epidural anesthesia, most likely everything will be fine, you will get good control of your labor pain and not experience any serious side effects. (Click here to read more about epidural anesthesia in general.)
However, epidurals can and do influence your labor, they affect your baby, they affect you, they affect your bonding with your baby, and they also can affect breastfeeding success. Usually, the side effects of epidurals are minor, but you need to be aware of them in order to make an informed decision about whether or not you find them acceptable.
Epidural side effects for labor and birth
- Epidurals usually slow down the progress of labor. This means your labor will take longer.
- It also means that often if you get an epidural, particularly if it is early on in labor, your progress will slow down and you will need to receive artificial oxytocin (pitocin, syntocinon) to keep your labor going. (Click here to read more about the cascade of interventions.)
- Epidurals usually cause a drop in blood pressure, so typically, you will need to receive intravenous fluids to compensate.
- Epidurals take away the sensation of bladder fullness, so you will need to get a catheter (a thin tube) inserted to help empty the bladder.
- Epidurals may prevent you from feeling the urge to push. This may slow down the second stage of labor, and increase the likelihood of instrumental delivery. This is when they need to use forceps or a vacuum to help get the baby out, and it comes with an episiotomy and may result in some abrasion of the baby.
Epidural side effects for the mother
- About 1 in 100 women will experience a severe headache after the epidural.
- Maternal fever occurs in 14.5% of women who receive epidural anesthesia, as opposed to just 1% of women who do not receive epidural anesthesia. If you have a fever, that increases the likelihood that your baby will be subjected to all sorts of invasive tests to see whether they have an infection, and both of you may be given antibiotic treatment as a preventive measure.
Epidural side effects for the baby
- The drugs used in epidurals enter the baby's circulation and may depress the baby's breathing. This can lead to an emergency cesarean or resuscitation measures after the baby is born.
- The drugs used in epidurals make the baby drowsy after birth, so they have more problems finding and latching on to the breast for breastfeeding.
Epidural side effects for mother-child interactions
- Many of the side effects listed above may interfere with mother-child bonding, especially if the result is separation of mother and baby.
- At least one study shows that mothers who received epidural anesthesia reported spending less time with their babies while in the hospital.
Rare epidural side effects
