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Published on: June 6, 2020
Practice of primary elective cesarean upon maternal request in the commonwealth of virginia
1Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology, Eastern Virginia Medical School, Norfolk, VA 23501-1980, USA. baydouha@evms.edu
Objectives:
To evaluate the practice of on-demand elective cesarean delivery in Virginia.
Design:
Cross-sectional.
Setting:
Hospital based.
Participants:
Nurse managers or labor and delivery charge nurses of all 55 hospitals in Virginia that provide obstetric services.
Methods:
Interviews were conducted with participants to obtain quantitative and qualitative data.
Results:
71.7% of hospitals reported that they would allow and have performed on-demand cesarean delivery. The prevalence of this practice did not vary substantially according to hospital size and type or characteristics of providers of obstetric care. The only criterion that all hospitals mandated before allowing on-demand cesarean delivery was that pregnancy must have completed 39 weeks of gestation.
Conclusions:
The perception of labor and delivery managers in Virginia is that on-demand elective cesarean delivery is a patient-driven practice that does not appear to be influenced by hospital characteristics.
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