Anyone had experience using this?

I am terrified it will harm baby. Can I decline it?

I was given pitocin when I had my son. It's the stuff they give to induce labor and bring on the contractions. I've never heard about it being a safety issue for babies though if someone else knows better, please enlighten!

What I have heard, and can safely say I experienced, is that pitocin, along with any of the other ones they use to speed up labor, increases the intensity and pain of contractions must faster than your body naturally would do, so for many women who have experienced both having it and not having it, I've heard that they felt it made labor a lot more painful than when they didn't have it. I personally can say that my labor was very painful and I was wanting an epidural after not long had gone by, and unfortunately had to wait til close to the end to get it, buggers.

Anyway, some women get ''the drip'' and do fine on gas and air or whatnot, but I tend to think far greater numbers of women feel the need for more pain relief when they have it.

I'm pretty sure you can refuse it if you want. Sometimes they have a sound medical reason why they would want to use it, though, so it's worth listening to your doc and deciding if it's in the best interest of you and baby. In my case, I had just gone into spontaneous labor a couple of hours beforehand, the day before my due date, so they really had no good reason to give it to me. Think they just wanted to get women in and out of there as quickly as possible, lol...

I'm very much hoping not to have anything like that during this pregnancy, but I'm open-minded as one never knows what medical reasons might come up to warrant various treatments.

I am being induced on sunday (8 days over) due to a very large baby apparently... I was worried about this over stimulating my uterus.

Thanks for the reply

Pitocon (US) or Syntocinon (UK) are both synthetic Oxytocin hormones of what you produce naturally in labour. Of course it is used to stimulate contractions both to induce labour and to contract the uterus down after delivery to reduce bleeding.

Guidelines are produced at every unit here in the UK for the safe use of this drug, it isn't something you can just whack in when it comes to inducing a woman. If you are eligible for the Syntocinon/Pitocin drip it is commenced at a very small dose and the dose is crept up slowly. At my unit, you start off with just 1ml of Syntocinon and this is crept up every half hour until you get the required strength and frequency of contractions. Some woman can be on anything from 4mls an hr to 24mls an hr, depends on the individual. Because it is a synthetic hormone with risks, this drug does require continous monitor of baby and contractions. If of course you are sensitive to the drug and start contracting frequently it will simply be decreased and of course if baby isn't happy also decreased.

Because the regime is every half hr there is control to make sure the uterus doesn't hyperstimulate. Maternity Units vary in their regime with how this drug is administered but you may find the approach of caution is similiar.

This drug at my unit is not the drug of choice when inducing anyone who has had a previous section or had more than 4 children.