[The impact of epidural analgesia on birth experience]

The satisfaction of our patients with the intrapartum analgesia and differences between labour with and without epidural analgesia (EDA) were analysed retrospectively.

In March 2004 questionnaires were sent to all women who gave birth between 1 January 2003 and 30 June 2003 at the University Hospital of Zurich.

45.5% of the questionnaires were returned. The EDA-rate reached 47.3%. Women with EDA had a significant longer delivery and the vacuum was more often used (p < 0.001 each). There was no difference between births with or without EDA concerning Apgar- and pH-scores from the umbilical artery. Several factors had an impact on satisfaction: higher age (> 30 years) (p = 0.012), the feeling that this labour was less painful than the previous (p = 0.010), the ability to control labour pain (p = 0.002), to influence drug therapy of pain (p < 0.001).

Our results show, that the individual care and involvement of women in the birth process and pain therapy had a greater influence on satisfaction with birth than the type of analgesia.