Her words, not mine

Body: 

So I had an OB nursing lecture today and the instructor, a very experienced high-risk pregnancy/NICU nurse said the following:

"Pelvic floor disease has become epidemic. It's caused by the overuse of epidurals. We've been using them for so long that women no longer know how to work with their bodies -- to receive feedback from them while pushing -- so that they do themselves great damage."

Hmmm . . . There is so much more to this prolapse and birthing story as we all know, *however* . . . . I find it fascinating to hear. (Now, I had a homebirth without epidural and still got a cystocele, but it has healed up really well, too). I am purely sharing this as food for thought, not as any sort of advice, judgement, yada, yada, yada.

P.S. Anyone know why fascial tissue grafts are not used in vaginal surgeries (instead of mesh)? It seems they can graft just about every other tissue. Is it the nature of the fascia itself? Or the notion that nothing natural could possibly be better than something made by DuPont? Most likely pelvic surgery would remain horrid, graft or no . . . . but I wonder.

Forgive me if none of the above makes sense! Teething toddler + nursing school = brain frazzle!

Hi Badmirror

I wish it were that simple, but surgical repairs of any sort are still surgical repairs, and often not much like the awesome original version. Anyway, the body needs all of its own fascia. Where would you take it from? Found this site the other day, www.anatomytrains.com . I gained an enormous amount of understanding of fascia from it. Our bodies are indeed a miracle.

Cheers

Louise

From cadavers? Pigs? Same sources as we get for skin grafts or heart valves or other sundry parts. I dunno. You're right, nothing is as good as the original, I know :-) Thanks for the website -- I'm very interested to check it out!

Well, her framework is a bit narrow, but at least she’s considering a reasonable etiology. It’s true that epidurals pave the way for the typical cascade of obstetric intervention. I think Michel Odent has the most accurate take on the matter: the more we interfere with human birth, the worse off humanity becomes. The human perineum should be sacrosanct and it will never garner that level of respect until enough women insist upon it.

By far the most common story is the woman who is two, three, and more weeks postpartum who feels something amiss and decides to reach for the mirror - eeeekk!! If the birth experience itself was the whole story, she would’ve discovered her condition immediately. Therefore, something in those postpartum weeks must be factored into the equation. We believe a major contributing factor is that her natural pelvic organ support system was not adequately supported by posture and lifestyle.

Biologic fascia types are used often in vaginal colporrhaphy surgery. They were dropped years ago in favor of polypropylene, but re-introduced when the synthetics proved so problematic. They tend to be absorbed by the body and so theoretically lose their “supportive” function. The paradigm of "strong" vaginal walls is so off the mark!

POST DELETED

A&P repairs were never successful, and that is why transvaginal mesh was introduced in an attempt to "strengthen" the vaginal walls. Polypropylene (plastic) mesh was developed and aggressively marketed because the biological meshes break down and are eventually absorbed by the body.

However, even if a 100% compatible mesh were developed, it wouldn't alter the fact that the operations themselves are fraught with risk and failure. The vagina is a flattened tube that protects itself from prolapse by remaining flattened toward the front and away from the outlet at the back. A&P repairs are based on the highly erroneous perspective of a soft tissue "floor" underneath the body upon which the pelvic organs are supported. The "hole" at the bottom of the "floor" must be made stronger, tighter, and smaller so the organs can't fall through. It is an egregiously wrong concept that has harmed countless women over the past century.

I have no doubt this is spam, and WoundHealer peddling the surgical solution with all the help she can get from the AMA and FDA.

Christine