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Pregnancy

Talk about every stage of pregnancy, from early symptoms to preparing for birth.

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Original poster

Acupuncture to induce labour...

18 replies

Bellyrub1980 · 22/10/2014 14:34

Did you try this? Did it work?

I just had a session and the baby is going pretty mental in there but nothing more.... Yet!!!

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Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

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Keenoonvino · 22/10/2014 16:55

I had reflexology when overdue with last pregnancy and it did a big fat nothing! I'm 6 days overdue tin this one and am considering acupuncture for when I'm 10 days over. Is that meant to be better than reflexology?

LizzieMint · 22/10/2014 16:59

If acupuncture (or curry or pineapple or reflexology...etc) worked, the NHS wouldn't have to spend loads of money on drugs to get labour going in an induction. Sorry, don't think anything genuinely works!

redexpat · 22/10/2014 17:16

Ive been reliably informed that acupuncture is the only alternative medicin which is proven to work. There was a thread on here a few weeks ago asking the same, there were several posters saying it haf worked for them.

Useless trivia: all danish mws are trained in acupuncture.

Original poster

Bellyrub1980 · 22/10/2014 17:46

I think the problem with acupuncture and research is the difficulty they have carrying out trials to the 'gold standard' (ie double blind, randomised, controlled) due to it being impossible to create a convincing sham treatment and difficultly blinding both parties. There's also the general reluctance to carry out trials on pregnant women.

I have a lot of faith in acupuncture for the treatment of other conditions (pain, insomnia, addiction, nausea) but doubt we will ever be able to produce evidence to conclusively prove it works for inducinganpur (certainly not to NICE standards and therefore for use in the NHS) so I'm actually much more interested in anecdotal evidence and peoples experiences.

I've had lots of braxton hicks and feelings of the baby bearing down with sharp cervix pain each time. But no actual contractions.

Did a load of squats and walking too... But nothing.

Might try reflexology next... Why not?!

OP posts:

Original poster

Bellyrub1980 · 22/10/2014 17:47

inducing labour

OP posts:

LIG1979 · 22/10/2014 18:03

worked for me (but cannot tell if it would have happened anyway).

was 38 weeks but was fairly sure labour was weeks off. so I said to her go for it.

session finished at 11, felt fine and went shopping. by 1pm was phoning the hospital and in hospital and dd was born at 9 pm.

I am fairly cynical of that sort of thing so not entirely convinced it was the acupuncture but that was how it happened. I do however know lots of people who have tried it when overdue and it didn't work.

Funkyfairy2004 · 22/10/2014 18:27

I had acupuncture before I was pregnant to help with anxiety and it really helped me and I have also been having reflexology over the last few weeks to help me sleep. I have to say that I feel much more relaxed, even if it doesn't induce you it might make you feel relaxed and it's a nice treat, I'm sure babies are more likely to arrive when mums are chilled out

ohthegoats · 22/10/2014 18:52

I had it when I was already having light contractions. Within an hour everything ground to a halt. No real labour for another 4 days.

goodbyeyellowbrickroad · 22/10/2014 19:01

I had acupuncture when I was 40+12 then again the following day. Started getting mild but pretty regular contractions after the second session then went into established labour at 40+14 (when I was scheduled for induction). DS was born 40+15. I can't honestly say that it's the acupuncture that did it, may well have been a coincidence, but by that stage after much walking, bouncing on birth balls and sex I was willing to give pretty much anything a go to try and avoid being induced.

gatewalker · 22/10/2014 19:13

Acupuncture worked rapidly and strongly for me ... within seconds of the last needle going in. It was so effective that the acupuncturist had to remove the needles because the contractions were so strong.

Imnotsurehowtogetthisout · 22/10/2014 23:27

I had Accupuncture on the NHS at my MDU. I had it for anxiety during pregnancy and then because I went over my due date. I loved it and felt it helped, placebo or not I would recommend it. After my last Accupuncture appt the MW gave me a sweep and I was 4cm dilated - we were both as surprised as each other because I hadn't felt any contractions! My waters broke the next day with the first contraction I felt and baby arrives 2hr4min later (first baby)!!

kaymondo · 22/10/2014 23:29

I had it at 2 weeks overdue with ds1 and it did nothing! Neither did 48 hours of induction, he was adamant that he wasn't moving!

Original poster

Bellyrub1980 · 23/10/2014 05:07

From what I've read some people are 'responders' of acupuncture and some people aren't.

I had the best nights sleep I've had in months last night!! Woke up ONCE!! Amazing!

OP posts:

MaMaPo · 23/10/2014 05:33

If you haven't seen this - the Cochrane review. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD002962.pub3/abstract;jsessionid=CB5B6C16F9B25EF20FEAEE0CB6B0574D.f02t01

Short version: it seems safe but there is not enough well designed evidence out there to say whether it works.

TinyMonkey · 23/10/2014 07:20

My NHS hospital has a full time maternity acupuncture service, so they must believe it has some worth.

MaMaPo · 23/10/2014 08:44

Yes, well the NHS has form for paying for homeopathy, so...

Original poster

Bellyrub1980 · 23/10/2014 08:58

Again, I'm only interested in anecdotal evidence from people who have actually had acupuncture to stimulate labour.

As I said above, although I'm aware of the research I'm not particularly interested in the outcomes (reasons also above).

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worldgonecrazy · 23/10/2014 09:07

I had acupuncture throughout my pregnancy and before whilst having IVF treatment. As my waters broke before labour had really begun, and I was on the 72 hour countdown to induction, I tried everything. Acupuncture, clary sage, raw pineapple, hot curries and sex. DD was born with a bit of help from the forceps at 71hrs and 55 minutes from countdown starting.

I believe that anything that helps you on a mental/rational level will go someway to contributing towards the outcome, even if it is only by helping to reduce the level of stress hormones in the body. Stress hormones are known to inhibit labour so I suppose there may be a scientific and rational explanation to this.

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