Identification of factors influencing the decision-to-delivery interval in emergency caesarean sections

In a life-threatening context, the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology and the Royal College of Obstetrics and Gynaecology recommend a maximum delay of 30 min between the decision to perform an emergency caesarean and the infant's birth. Our objectives were to estimate the rate of prolonged intervals and identify the factors influencing the decision-to-delivery interval.

All women who had given birth at Saint-Etienne University Hospital by a non-prophylactic caesarean section between September 1 and November 1, 2007 were included in a prospective cohort study. A linear regression analysis was performed to identify the factors influencing the decision-to-delivery interval.

68 women were included in the study. Regardless of the degree of emergency, the decision-to-delivery interval exceeded the recommended interval in 50% of the cases. In extremely urgent caesarean sections, the optimal interval of 15 min was exceeded in 85.7% of cases. We found that two factors contributed to delayed patient care: urgent and extremely urgent caesareans and hospitalization in a pathological pregnancy unit. This delay leads to more paediatric reanimations.

This study highlights the difficulty to reach the recommended target interval. One solution is to improve the identification of the degree of urgency and the communication between the various members of the healthcare team.