...to be cross with this doctor's presence during the birth?

[chickenchops]

Really not sure if i am or not.

I was induced and three hours later given an epidural by the on call anaesthetist. I didn't really like him. He was cross I was skipping the peth injection, got very cross with me when i moved slightly when he stuck me in the back with a needle (without warning), was just overall very abrupt and rude. Oh well i thought... I will never have to see him again.

My labour stalled and I got exhausted. Cue OB coming with ventouse. Just after she arrived, so did the anaesthetist.

He did not speak to me. He did not check any equipment. He did ask midwife if she had to use any boosters. (yes she said. one. although she did not disclose that i was finding the epidural less and less effective and had put me back on gas and air after 2 hours it was sited). the OB got her kit out and got between my legs. Anaesthetist then took position just to her right to watch the birth.

No one explained why he was there. he did not tell me. he made a few inappropriate comments i could have done without and then just well, watched.

Several things went wrong with my birth/aftercare. I ended up writing a letter to the hospital pointing out some aspects of my care that really were wrong and also mentioned that I was quite unhappy that this guy just showed up and hung out between my legs. they were quite surprised I was unhappy about this as "but chicken chops, he's a doctor". I wound up in a meeting with them this week and again expressed how distasteful i found this. they were again gobsmacked and said no one had ever complained before as most women simply don't mind.

really?

I'm not british and grew up in a strict evangelical christian household. I am wondering if i am being precious about my dignity to due how i was raised? Or, would you have found this offensive too?

for the record, the story has changed several times as to why he was there but no one disagrees that while he was there he did nothing.

so... aibu?

Im really quite astounded at some of the replys on this thread , where do some of you get off telling the Op how she would feel ?

Op , i had a similar experience , its not nice , i sympathise . I think you were right to complain .

YANBU,
If there was no reason for him to be there he had no right to be there. he also had no reason to stand watching the birth, he could have stood somewhere else. It might have been a medical procesdure, but not one he needed to observe.
You had every right to make a complaint, and keep making them about their poor record keeping if anything. It should have been recorded that he was there. As he keeps making different stories about why he was there I would also make a complaint about him as a doctor rather than just as part of the team. he had no right to stand there watching without your permission.

I used to have a schoolfriend whose mother was a midwife, and I know for a fact that at least once she took some other friends to the hospital to witness a birth, and told the parents they were student midwives. Still makes me angry that she thought this was OK.

but it's happened, and really, no harm done, people telling her she was violated\perved over is nothelping...the hosp have seemingly reviewed stuff, she needs to move on, big time.

Can I also ask why peopel think it is acceptable for women to have people who do not need to view the birth viewing them giving birth as it is natural, beautiful, a medical procedure, they have a medical degree, but if random medical staff to come in to have a look at a man getting a proctology exam, or a woman getting a smear test there would be outrage.

i'll be honest here, they probably hoped assumed a midwife going over notes with her would make her go away.

OP can i just ask, did you have a birth plan and was your experience re pain relief\intervention a long way off what happened (obv aside from the emergency stuff) sometimes people have a very high expectation of themselves in labour.

no, YANBU, he was at least not being sensitive to your feelings, which are of course important as you are the one giving birth, not them!

'no-one else minded' is a silly argument. it doesn't make it ok.

I don't know why people keep bringing up the idea that this Dr was "perving" - the OP has never suggested that.

Have not read all the posts.
iteotwawki er no 'we do not all have to do 10 deliveries before we can be qualified' maybe in the UK but NOT everywhere.

OP there is absolutely NO excuse for you to be made to feel the way you did, there is obviously something odd as the story keeps changing. I find the behaviour if you describe it correctly very odd. If it is not an emergency they should introduce themselves and explain why they are there. You should always be given the option of declining students

Maybe all the anaethetists on here will have a re think and take some learning points from the poster we become too medicalised and blase.

Hope you get the answers you need I am this is having such an impact on you

VLB - a midwife shouldn't be doing the stronger topups required to produce surgical anaesthesia. Lower dose top ups for labour analgesia is fine but the larger volumes of more concentrated solutions should not be administered without an anaesthetist present. I am surprised a midwife would think otherwise.

Re assisted deliveries / haemorrhage - poorly phrased. Difficult assisted deliveries have a higher likelihood of PPH is a better way of putting it.

Im a bit concerned because Ihave read through all of this thread and its a long one so I am sorry if I missed it but at no point does the OP say the baby is ok, she says in one post that there was only one time her husband held him, Im hoping she just means during the delivery and he is fine?

I have a Mullerian anomoly (sic?) which means that any time I go near the gynae or when I had both my babies theres always a queue for a squizz at me. I say yes because I think its important for students and newer docs to understand what they might come up against in the future but the key point is I SAY YES, at no point has anyone ever trotted in for a look without me being asked first.

However I certainly dont have a very clear picture of what exactly happened when with either of my deliveries, it is a very confusing time and from what the OP is saying I think she doesnt have a clear memory either. Shes gone through a horrible experience but there does come a point where she says, I have done all I can about this unless I want to raise a court case, and focuses on how to move forward from now on. Hopefully with her gorgeous little baby.

I also

Oops sorry about the stray I also, I had nothing else to say.

Gasman,
You said you might go to the "business end" to guage how far along things are. Why not ask the obstrician, or at least ask the patient if they are ok with this, and explain your reasons? It is not a case of accusing people about looking for kicks (although if this doctor was just hanging around for personal interest then it was for kicks, just not sexual ones), but about them acting unprofessionally. If something had happened to the OP or her patient then there would have been an official investigation, and the staff who did not make a record of him being they would have been in serious trouble as would he.

The idea seems to be that childbirth is part of being female so accept however people treat you and be grateful for it. The same people who act like this would never dream about treating a man getting a proctology exam or procedure like an interesting medical show to observe just out of interest and then tell him he should be grateful he got treated..

Xpost - in UK medical training a student has to do 10 normal deliveries before passing the O&G attachment. Not to say that once trained we should all be able to wander in and out of rooms as we please but to say that most of us have seen enough in the course of training not to be somewhere for our own amusement.

I am [sceptical] at the number of people who can categorically state, without being there or having read any of the documentation, that this doctor fucked up. I am not saying he didn't, mind you.

Unfortunately what's written in the notes is what people go by - if it's not written down then it didn't happen, even if it did. Which is why it is so important to keep contemporaneous notes. On our unit the midwives document the time anyone else is called and why, their time of arrival and their time of departure, you could definitely suggest an improvement to notes management OP.

I suspect if these doctors have worked together over a period of time they have fallen into an easy working relationship where they each know what the other one is there for and why without having to discuss it. They may not have realised how that can come across.

For the record, I would always explain my presence at a delivery if I was called to one.

Iteotawaki, no I wasn't suggesting that a midwife should do a larger volume of a concentrated top up. Though I've never seen a concentrated top up be needed for a ventouse so to be honest that never crossed my mind in relation to this post. Only seen an anaesthetist needed to administer a stronger block for a forceps (or obviously for a section) and where I work forceps are always in theatre with full team, odp, scrub nurse.

You said you might go to the "business end" to guage how far along things are. Why not ask the obstetrician

Because when things are more difficult it's not always appropriate to interrupt the surgeon with questions. There is also a recognised occurrence called "fixation error" where you are so focussed on one thing (eg the descent of the baby, what the heart rate is doing and whether it will come out) that you don't notice something else equally relevant (like blood loss). It's well known in the aviation industry which is something medicine is trying to learn from.

I don't find it odd that the OP remembers stuff in detail. It's well recognised that women in labour will remember exact words, phrases said to them in labour for years afterwards. Something to do with increased adrenaline I think.

i agree with herbie, and i've had 3 births, 2 of them with no drugs\gas and air and very calm experiences where my head was V straight,i can remember bits of it, but not who was where,when and exactly what was said.

Well my dd is 10 and I can remember stuff that was said to me word for word.

His presence is obviously recorded when he did the epidural. he screwed up then by not telling me what he was doing and laying into me for not taking peth. "why won't you take it? why? its good stuff!". repeatedly. not harm came from either of these situations. luckily, considering the first.

the delivery was 8 hours later. he had been in the room next door doing an epidural. i know because it was my friend and she said, I had an epidural at 7 from him! i think he realised i was about to deliver and popped his head in. he was not called etc so am guessing he wasn't expected to stay and therefore his presence not recorded.

I am still annoyed that he stood around whilst i haemorrhaged instead of doing anything to help. It was a pretty good size haemorrhage too- 2 liters.

Soooo there was an emergency, which he did nothing for and his story on why he was there has changed three times. not: i haven't accepted why he was there so they've explained it differently three times. he himself has changed why he was there three times.

Publichair: My birth plan said, no peth, I want an epidural. no forceps but ventouse ok but would rather not have a trial of assisted delivery if didn't look like it would be very likely to work.

My birth plan also said i would rather tear then have an episotomy. the OB knew this so did the episotomy without telling me. unfortunately when she did it, she severed a major blood vessel... this contributed to the mass bleed. but she's apologised- what more can i ask for?

Rhonda: Our gorgeous boy is sound asleep upstairs... thankfully i meant my husband only held him during the delivery when i haemorrhaged.

Oh I am so relieved - I really hoped that was what you had meant!

Noone has even said congratulations on the baby. Its been a horrible experience and you are most definitely NBU to be upset, but the important thing is how you manage to move on from here, so work out what it is you need and get it, whether its an apology, counselling, whatever works for you.

And - congratulations!!

it sounds like you wanted one thing and got another, and to be honest, any anaesthetist\midwife would have tried to persuade you to do cheap\easy anaesthesia rather than rushing to epidural.

i think you are focussing on blaming someone, because you didn't get what you want. You were given an episiotomy without discussion and an epidural without discussion with a sheet over your head. were you perhaps a bit freaked out and panicky and maybe aren't remembering what happened.

i also don't understand why you were given 3 different explanations as to why he was there- have you asked 3 times and if so, why. what do you want.

I am remembering everything. anytime i say to my husband: xyz happened? he says yes, thats exactly what happened.

I wanted an epidural. I got one. i'm not focused on blaming anybody. haemorrhages are unfortunate and happen.

I just -again- wanted to know if i was being unreasonable to find a random doctors presence between my legs when he was doing nothing, distasteful. it seems half of you think yes, half think no. thats all i wanted to know.

again, i am not taking anything further other then just moving on myself.