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When managing shoulder dystocia (SD), clinicians must minimize the time interval between delivery of the fetal head and body while avoiding undue force during obstetric maneuvers (JW Womens Health Jun 16 2011). Researchers sought to determine a head-to-body delivery time interval below which neonatal complications would be minimized by evaluating such intervals in 127 term newborns with uncomplicated SD and in 55 newborns with SD leading to persistent brachial plexus injury with or without neonatal depression (defined by the occurrence of fetal demise, need for cardiopulmonary resuscitation or intubation, umbilical artery pH <7.00, or 5-minute Apgar score ≤5).
Median head-to-body delivery interval was 1.0 minute (interquartile range, 0.5–1.0…