I am answering this speaking completely from an allopathic medical perspective, so keep that in mind. I don't necessarily agree with the whole thinking, but it is the way I was trained, so I do understand what they were thinking.
In general, for preterm labor or preterm contractions, the standard of care is not to do a digital cervical exam at all, or if one is deemed necessary (to determine degree of dilation, especially if you are not sure if this is labor or not) to only do one if you have definitively concluded that the membranes are intact. To definitively conclude this, a sterile speculum exam is performed, and any fluid seen tested usually with nitrazine and by ferning. Ferning is more specific than nitrazine paper, since nitrazine can also turn blue due to blood, or cervical mucus. Especially in a case where the docs in question don't know the patient, I expect they would proceed with this standard of care. A gentle speculum exam should not theoretically stimulate contractions since the speculum theoretically only touches the outside of the cervix.
Preterm contractions can be caused by vaginal infections or by urinary tract infections so that is why they like to rule those things out.
Anyway, I'm guessing that's why they were bugging you to have an exam. When you don't want something the docs are recommending, they generally come up with more and more forceful and sometimes outlandish reasons why you should have it done, so you tend to go from "well, since you are having regular contractions and you're not due for over a month, we really should do a speculum exam to make sure there isn't a reason for these contractions, like a vaginal infection, or a slow amniotic fluid leak" to "If you don't have this test you and your baby could die." (Like, um, hello isn't the worst we're talking here is a slightly preterm baby born to a healthy mom since there aren't any other signs of generalized infection?)
In general, for preterm labor or preterm contractions, the standard of care is not to do a digital cervical exam at all, or if one is deemed necessary (to determine degree of dilation, especially if you are not sure if this is labor or not) to only do one if you have definitively concluded that the membranes are intact. To definitively conclude this, a sterile speculum exam is performed, and any fluid seen tested usually with nitrazine and by ferning. Ferning is more specific than nitrazine paper, since nitrazine can also turn blue due to blood, or cervical mucus. Especially in a case where the docs in question don't know the patient, I expect they would proceed with this standard of care. A gentle speculum exam should not theoretically stimulate contractions since the speculum theoretically only touches the outside of the cervix.
Preterm contractions can be caused by vaginal infections or by urinary tract infections so that is why they like to rule those things out.
Anyway, I'm guessing that's why they were bugging you to have an exam. When you don't want something the docs are recommending, they generally come up with more and more forceful and sometimes outlandish reasons why you should have it done, so you tend to go from "well, since you are having regular contractions and you're not due for over a month, we really should do a speculum exam to make sure there isn't a reason for these contractions, like a vaginal infection, or a slow amniotic fluid leak" to "If you don't have this test you and your baby could die." (Like, um, hello isn't the worst we're talking here is a slightly preterm baby born to a healthy mom since there aren't any other signs of generalized infection?)
