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1. They are not accurate.-many nurses have openly told me how often they fail and give false positive tracings.
2. Takes freedom away from mom’s movement in turn slows down the labor process.
3. Medical staff become too dependent upon it and look for clinical problems when there are none.
4. Constant sound of fetal heart beat- labor can last 4-48 hrs. Babies heart beats 145 times a minute. Imagine 145 beats a minute for 18 hrs next to your head. (Unless you like things that go “PING”)
5. Causes false alarms
6. Use of fetal monitor leads to other interventions.- Epidural because loss of free movement and bed restriction increases pain.
7. Detracts from the momentum of birth if a ‘ drop in heart rate is heard’ 12 people come into the room to find that monitor slipped out of place.
8. Loss of independence and makes mothers feel ‘ trapped and weak”
9. Belly binding for monitors itchy.
10. Increases stress in labor all around.
*Numerous studies have shown that the fetal monitor does not increase the safety of fetus or mother, in fact the clinical use of the monitor increases the likely hood of unnecessary intervention.
Getting back to the Nature of Birth 