Patient controlled mobile epidural?

[georgarina]

Any experience with this?

My hospital offers it and sounds great - you can still move around and you control the levels.

I didn't have pain relief first time.

I had this.
You don't actually have as much control as you think though ( don't believe I did anyway).
It's set at a certain amount and once you've got to that you can press and press the button but you'll not be adding anything
Although I do think the placebo affect where you think you're topping yourself up could be helpful for some.

I had this as I had a back to back labour. I never expected to have an epidural but this worked amazingly well for me. I liked that I could still walk around, use the birthing ball, go to the toilet etc and still feel my legs. You could press the button every 20mins for more pain relief but I only used it more frequently than hourly when I was pushing and needed forceps delivery. I did accidentally leave it too long at one point and could feel the contraction so it does work effectively and very quickly.

I read about this when pregnant with my first as it was widely used in the states, not available for me at the time but sounds great. A friend in America was planning on using it and v excited by it, though ended up giving birth within 15 minutes of arriving in hospital so didn't get a chance to try it out in the end! The biggest issue with epidural is that being immobile can increase risk of intervention, I LOVED my epidural so it sounds like an absolute win-win for me (sadly not available in my hospital this time around either)

Yes I had a full block for dc1, they prepped for c section, I couldn't feel a thing or move. I did not like it and was left post partum being unable to lift my baby and was told they'd take her to get formula fed as I hadn't tried to feed her. It was awful ( I fought back and successfully breast fed, no thanks to them)

Dc2 was a controlled one. So much better, I could click away when it got horrible but ease off when I wanted to feel things. I could still walk and the whole experience was far far better.

I'd be too worried about spinal damage to have an epidural in any circumstances, and very concerned about knocking it and dislodging it if I was walking around with one in!

Thanks everyone! Sounds perfect as far as I can see

Think this is what Kimberley Walsh was talking about in her birth story in one of the magazines! I’d never heard of it before