Session 6

More labor and delivery! To be honest, most of what we do with this session (in my experience) is catch up from Session 5 because we didn’t get done with those activities. But there are lots of other ideas you can add in as well.

Opener – I love talking about names. What does it mean? How did you get it? Usually fun and interesting.

From the Facilitator’s Guide:

1. Watching a short labor video and discussing the comfort measures used. I haven’t done this in years but I bet it works. 
   
2. Labor decisions and communication continuum – I honestly hadn’t seen it before! BUSTED for not reading the Facilitators’ Guide closely enough! I really like this and will use it in the future. I love a good continuum. And there is a lot to discuss about how we handle communication with our provider team in the hospital. HOWEVER, I would preface this activity with the statement that there is no "right answer" to these continuums. Both sides have their benefits and drawbacks, which is why it makes for an interesting discussion.
   

Here are some other things that we have done:

1. Labor stations – Using stuff from Lamaze and Penny Simkins, I made the following posters and cards that you can do to talk about different positions and things you can do for comfort during each stage of labor. I post the stations on the wall around the room, then you can do the discussion in a couple of ways:
   
   • Assign a couple of people to each stage, and have them talk about and demonstrate which of the tips and positions would help in each station.
     
   • Or, you can hand out all the tips / positions cards and have them guess which labor station that one would be good for (I attach Velcro to the back of the cards and to the stations posters so they can stick the card on the appropriate station). 
     
2. Labor or not? I post the attached posters with Velcro on them, and pass out the symptoms cards (also with Velcro) to participants. I have them stick their symptom on the appropriate poster and then we discuss. Again, there is not necessarily a right or wrong answer to some of these, so make sure the patients know that!
   
3. Labor story cards - I learned this from Mindy, a Nurse-Midwife in Conway SC. Everyone takes 3 or so of the cards attached and then that becomes their "labor story" and everyone takes turns telling their story to the group. We talk about what may happen in those stories and why. Sometimes it becomes goofy if someone gets two things that should be exclusive (i.e. "My labor started at 32 weeks" and "My labor started at 41 week") but often we can talk about why both things might happen in some cases. Or, just laugh it off as ridiculous. I'm still looking for more scenarios that are a little bit funny, because it was fun when we tried this at the consortium meeting to laugh at some of the outcomes. Let me know if you have any ideas.

For the labor stations section, I MAKE the patients demonstrate the positions. They often resist. But, I think it’s important. In my experience, a lot of patients are very uncomfortable in their own bodies, and need the opportunity to try stretches and stuff. But, it takes some prodding most times.

labor stations 2014.pdf (39.72 KB)
Labor stations 04apr11.pdf (489.53 KB)
labor or not.pdf (23.78 KB)