Essentials of Fetal Monitoring

This comprehensive guide to fetal monitoring, now in its fourth edition, provides an exhaustive compilation of up-to-date knowledge on the signs of fetal well-being and compromise obtained from FHR monitoring. Newly revised and updated, it features two new chapters on monitoring maternal heart rate patterns and legal issues involved in care, new fetal monitor "strips," and updated visual materials, references and resources. This book is an invaluable companion for labor and delivery nurses, nurse midwives, and maternal-child and family nurses.

• Covers systematic assessment of the pregnant patient
• Addresses external and internal fetal and maternal monitoring
• Includes a step-by-step guide to fetal monitoring equipment and procedures
• Contains detailed reproductions of actual fetal monitor tracings
• Clarifies differences between maternal and fetal heart rate patterns
• Includes NICHD definitions as alternative terminology for documentation
• Identifies ineffective actions that can delay timely interventions
• Sets forth legal issues
• Provides skill-testing exercises

This hands-on workbook, designed for long-term and frequent use, is of value for any nurse currently working in a labor and delivery setting as well as those entering the field.

Introduction

Section 1 Systematic Assessment of the Pregnant Woman

Section 2 The Paper

Section 3 External and Internal Fetal Monitoring

Section 4 Maternal Heart Rate Patterns

Section 5 Uterine Contractions

Section 6 The Baseline

Section 7 Baseline Variability

Section 8 Short-Term Variability

Section 9 Accelerations

Section 10 Early Decelerations

Section 11 Late and Spontaneous Decelerations

Section 12 Variable Decelerations and the Checkmark Pattern

Section 13 Prolonged Decelerations

Section 14 Chronic Hypoxia, Acute Asphyxia

Section 15 Strip Evaluation and Categorization

Section 16 NICHD Defi nitions

Section 17 Skills Validation

Glossary: Fetal Heart Monitoring Terms

Index