CHARACTERISTICS OF EPIDURAL ANALGESIA IN PREGNANT WOMEN DURING LABOR AT THE INSTITUTO NACIONAL MATERNO PERINATAL, 2022-2024

Huayanay Bernabé M.E. · Revista de la Facultad de Medicina Humana (2025) · DOI: 10.25176/rfmh.v25i3.7690

Resumen

This study describes the clinical and obstetric characteristics, use, and outcomes of epidural analgesia in 6, 204 pregnant women attended between 2022 and 2024 at the Instituto Nacional Materno Perinatal. It was an observational, retrospective, descriptive study based on electronic records. Most participants were nulliparous (62.3%), overweight or obese (88.4%), and initiated analgesia during the active phase (81.7%); bupivacaine 0.125% was the predominant dose (73.8%). Epidural technique was used in 98.5% of cases, with maintenance mainly through manual bolus (94.8%). At twenty minutes, 97.1% reported mild pain (verbal numerical scale <3), and 78.8% maintained this level during the expulsive phase. The overall incidence of adverse events was 1.8%, mainly dural puncture (0.7%). Newborns achieved an APGAR score ≥7 in 97.4% of cases. Epidural analgesia showed a favorable profile of safety and pain control in this cohort, although analytical studies are needed to confirm its effectiveness. © It is an open access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International, CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided that the original work is duly cited.