leaving cord intact after delivery can be harmful to baby?? - Page 3

[mommyfied]

Originally Posted by smeep

Just to throw out there another reason why immediate cord clamping is BS, there was a study done on delayed cord clamping that showed an increase in infant iron stores. And they only delayed for 1-2 minutes which is LONG before the cord stops pulsing. Just google it, it's easy enough to find.

Not to mention just using common sense: if delayed cord clamping was so dangerous, HOW has the human race survived? Because, last I checked, we didn't have clamps and scissors thousands of years ago. Or other mammals for that matter. I don't know, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe all those videos of other mammals waiting and then later chewing the cord after birthing the placenta were fakes. I could totally see a bunch of cats rushing in with clamps and scissors to cut the dog's cord so the puppy doesn't die.

This is exactly how I see things.

[Kidzaplenty]

That is a very interesting link. (Thanks)

I thought this part was particularly interesting:

The immediately clamped newborn has, in effect, been subjected to a massive hemorrhage, [12] losing up to 50% of its blood volume; however, the actual amount of blood loss varies greatly with the circumstances of the particular birth and with the speed with which the cord is clamped. At normal, spontaneous delivery, the contracting uterus may squeeze blood into the child during the second stage of labor; if the child cries before the trunk is delivered, the contraction that delivers the child may also deliver a “full” placental transfusion before the clamp can be applied. Similarly, a mother who delivers in the squatting position will usually transfuse the child fairly adequately by gravity before the clamp can be applied. A normal, spontaneous delivery (with the mother supine) followed by immediate placement of the child on the mother’s abdomen may result in considerable gravitational blood loss into the placenta if the clamp is placed during uterine diastole. Rarely, when a clamp happens to be placed during a strong uterine contraction, the child may be over-transfused with blood that would have drained back into the placenta had the clamp not been placed. In general, most newborns that breathe immediately after a normal vaginal delivery will not lose a critical amount of blood volume from early cord clamping.

So, I guess all the doctors are not quite incorrect when they talk about the baby needing to be lower than the placenta or the blood will flow back out of the baby. Of course, it all depends on if the cord is clamped and when.