Risks of refusing induction

[Preposteroushypothesis]

I know that the drs and midwives say that they don't know how long the placenta can keep functioning for past 42ish weeks and so the risks are higher of something going wrong...what I want to know is whether there is actual data to back this up or whether its a sort of 'just in case' policy?

I was born in another country and at the time (I have no idea whether they do now) they did not induce babies unless there was a specific need to do so. I was 3 weeks overdue, born in 3 hours and obviously fine. I still have a while to go but I really don't want to be induced but want to know the facts, so, for example, in other countries that don't induce, is there a higher rate of babies dying if left over 42 weeks? Does anyone know this?

There is a booklet by AIMS which goes through the pros and cons in detail.
www.aims.org.uk/pubs3.htm#induction

I would def have an induction. I know of two people personally and also have heard about people whos babies died as a result of being too overdue and it was proven that that had the baby/babies been induced earlier they would have survived. Not trying to scare you but these are my experiences and if I were you, I wouldn't risk it. x

Another thing to note is that if you are currently a low risk pregnancy, as soon as you refuse an induction you become automatically high risk so will have a heavily managed birth and may not be able to access facilities like MLU/birthing pools etc

I am very interested in this and would really appreciate any advice from people that have been in the same boat. I am 40 + 6 overdue with my 4th and my midwife has obviously advised that an induction might be necessary.

This is my last pregnancy and I had all my others at home and would absolutely hate going into hospital. Not only that we have recently moved and have no one who can have the other other 3. If we had we could of course get my mum but she is quite elderly and its a 3 hour journey and our 3 year is not used to being away from us for too long. It would just add to the stress of the whole occasion! Any thoughts greatly appreciated......

I might add I am very fit and have had an easy pregnancy (if that is relevant). The first 2 were 7 days late and the third was on his due date.

There is no way that the claim that that the babies would have survived can be substantiated - its a counterfactual.

OP this link may help you think through the issues involved www.theunnecesarean.com/blog/2009/10/3/postdates-separating-fact-from-fiction.html

I'm not sure on the statistics etc so I really can't comment on those and I wouldn't like to guess.

I was induced (waters broke but labour didn't start) and I had a very positive experience. I know induction can be viewed as a negative thing but it doesn't have to be a bad thing. Would I have liked to go into labour naturally? Yes, I definitely would. And would I have liked to not have the drip and monitor constantly attached to me? Yes, I would have liked the freedom to move about. But would I change the fact I had an induction? No.

The only downside was that I didn't get to be as active as I would have liked, but then that can happen whatever type of birth you have. I'm not trying to sway anyone into having an induction, just wanted to give a different perspective

ItsAllGoingToBeFine that's an interesting point, I wasn't aware of that. But surely, the act of being induced means you're automatically treated in that way anyway - ie constant monitoring, no access to birthing pool, high intervention etc.

So really the message is 'your birthing experience will suck if your baby stays put any longer than the medical professionals deem is overdue'.

As someone who's dates have been moved forward by scans etc to an impossible date by a week (ergo am much much more likely to be deemed 'overdue'), this is not very encouraging!

This isn't the advice I have been given Itsallgoingtobefine...
I am currently 39 weeks and have discussed with the midwife the chances of going well overdue. My understanding is that the placenta CAN (not will) become less effective. To counteract this, I would have to go in for monitoring for about 30mins a day with a consultant to check everything is still functioning OK. If so, I should still be able to have my midwife home birth. Obviously if anything is wrong or there was any medical reason I would go straight to hospital, but I don't think that just being 2 weeks overdue should be reason to be induced.

PS should add, fingers crossed for all of us (that want) having nice timely natural babies :)

With DD I went to 40+12 before going into labour naturally.

I said I wanted to do more monitoring instead of induction - and the midwife made me "provisionally book" an induction for the friday - and I had to have an appointment on the wednesday with a consultant to discuss the risks of not having it. I never made the consultation because i went into labour early hours of that morning.

My booked induction would have been 40+14 (normal in my area)

I found a graph of data (which I had printed to take to appointment)showing risk from 40 weeks to 40+14 increased , after 14 days the risk actually flattened off. It looked to me by letting me go over 40 weeks they were actually letting me incure the most risk - then any further days after 40+14 weren't significantly increasing the risk. i also knew every day that passed the baby was more likely to come along.

now I am obviously going to try look for a link to that graph.

as an aside - with DD i wanted to avoid induciton as I was scared of "the drip", epidural/ intervention in general. My "natural" birth ended in epidural, augmentation with the drip, ventouse and episiotomy! But we were fine and I recovered really quickly.

Subsequently - I would probably be less scared of an induction now IYSWIM?

Ok going to google that link

www.google.co.uk/search?q=stillbirth+risks+against+weeks+gestation+graph&client=firefox-a&hs=xkm&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=74GnUbLoFIvu0gWW5YB4&ved=0CAoQ_AUoAQ&biw=1400&bih=741#facrc=_&imgrc=HgVdhdWjdQjiKM%3A%3Br8v2gUxbMegl-M%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fars.els-cdn.com%252Fcontent%252Fimage%252F1-s2.0-S0002937806007435-gr1.jpg%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.sciencedirect.com%252Fscience%252Farticle%252Fpii%252FS0002937806007435%3B788%3B475

www.google.co.uk/search?q=stillbirth+risks+against+weeks+gestation+graph&client=firefox-a&hs=xkm&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=74GnUbLoFIvu0gWW5YB4&ved=0CAoQ_AUoAQ&biw=1400&bih=741#facrc=_&imgrc=lBQAaKpOvDyDDM%3A%3BAjYe-8DyES3MEM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.phac-aspc.gc.ca%252Fpublicat%252F2008%252Fcphr-rspc%252Fgfx%252Ffigure2A-eng.jpg%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.phac-aspc.gc.ca%252Fpublicat%252F2008%252Fcphr-rspc%252Foverview-apercu-eng.php%3B595%3B434

If you do the same google search as me there are also graphs which show the risk as continuing to increase after 42 weeks.

Oh actually the graphs which don't show the dip/flattening aren't showing beyond 42 weeks.

I was 42 weeks with DD2 when my I had some water leak out of me on a Friday morning. I saw my consultant straightaway who recommended I be induced immediately to prevent any infection to me or the baby. I was adamant I didn't want the medical intervention of an induction afraid of how the drip would affect my contractions and increase the length of labour. I was also convinced it would lead to a caesarean. My consultant said ultimately it was my decision but he strongly urged me to go ahead and get induced as the risk if infection was real (only 1% according to my research) and I still said no.
I managed to put him off until the Monday, two days after my water broke, convinced I would naturally go into labour on my own over the weekend. I didn't!! I ended up being induced and had a very positive vaginal birth and a beautiful healthy baby(who is crawling all over me as I write this)
However!!!! Four days later I was re-admited back into hospital suffering from a 42 degrees temperature and hallucinating! I had caught an infection and baby and I remained in hospital together for 4 more days where they had no idea where the infection stemmed from or how to deal with it.
I wish I had listened to my consultant...it was the worse four days of my life, fevered, in pain, looking after a newborn in hospital on my own and away from my two year old.
Some births are grossly mismanaged but if there's ever a risk of harm to mum or baby vs wanting to do things "your way" it's just not worth the risk.
Good luck and hope it all goes well.

Threads like this one are a nightmare sometimes. Whatever experiences we've all had are just anecdotes and the plural of anecdote is not data, which is what the OP asked for.

When you add that to a discourse of 'of course I'd rather be torn apart by wild wolves than risk an iota of harm to the baby' then there's little way to draw sensible conclusions. Of course it's never that simple though is it? I'd not risk my baby's life if thats definitely the only thing on the table but rather not risk the dangers of induction if the alternative isn't that straightforward . After all I do already have another child who still needs her mother, and still needs the financial support a working mother can offer. A dead one isn't much use to her, & she didn't stop counting when the blue lines came up on the pg test. And yet people are shocked when I say that I would only accept an induction for a clear AND present danger not a speculative one.

Yes, they are anecdotes, but having seen someone on another forum recently lose her baby at 43 weeks after refusing induction and despite going in daily for monitoring, having already lost two daughters myself, I wouldn't risk it, no matter how small the risks.

However, it's a moot point for me anyway as going into labour without it being planned is a huge risk to me, so it's likely I'll be induced at 37 weeks.