Search for tag: "woman"

Interviewer: Have you ever watched those movies or TV shows where there's a woman in an elevator about to give birth and the elevator is stuck and you're stuck in there with her and you're panicking and you don't know what to do? We're going to tell you next on The Scope.

Announcer: Covering all aspects of women's health. This is the Seven Domains of Women's Health with Dr. Kirtly Jones on The Scope.

Interviewer: We're talking today with Dr. Kirtly Parker Jones. Dr. Jones, I've never been in the situation and I hope I never have to be. But in case I ever do come across it, if I'm stuck in an elevator with a woman about to go into labor or if we're stuck on the highway and the ambulance isn't coming in time and I'm a bystander and I want to help, what are things I need to be doing? What advice do you have for somebody that's just standing there, panicking?

Dr. Jones: First of all don't panic.

Interviewer: Don't panic.

Dr. Jones: Don't panic. Well I'll tell you a story. Some years ago and it was probably late in night. I was on labor and delivery as the attending physician and the elevator door actually opens and it's an orthopedic resident and a woman who actually has given birth in the elevator. So she walked into the front door of the hospital, which is not really close to labor and delivery and was close to delivering. And she didn't know where to go and he took her, as he should, to the elevator and things then happened pretty quickly.

So he was strutting around. He was so proud that he had delivered the baby. But when we actually got to the woman her panties weren't really even off, so I don't think he did anything. So when he said, "I delivered this baby." I said "I think she delivered this baby." And in fact that's what you need to remember. If the baby's coming that fast you just stand back.

So you stand back, you can make sure that the mom maybe is on the ground so the baby isn't going to fall and you want to make sure that the baby if anything, if the baby comes out that the baby's put next to the moms chest. The baby needs to be warm.

Interviewer: Okay.

Dr. Jones: You do not have to cut the cord. Somebody else can do that. If you're in the elevator you can wait for that but mostly . . .

Interviewer: It's not an emergency.

Dr. Jones: It's not an emergency. You keep your hands off.

Interviewer: Keep your hands to yourself.

Dr. Jones: Keep your hands to yourself.

Interviewer: Got you. Okay.

Dr. Jones: If the baby's coming that fast and the woman is on the ground so the baby's not going to fall. Then all you do is you wait. If you have something that's relatively clean so that you can wipe off the baby's face and mouth and then put the baby on the mom's bare chest so that skin to skin so the baby can stay warm. Cover them up. Don't feel like you have to cut anything. You can just wait.

Interviewer: And the mom will be okay.

Dr. Jones: Yeah. The mom's going to be okay. Now the biggest risk to the mom who's having birth that fast is not the baby coming out, because the baby's coming out, it's, is the placenta going to come out. And normally the placenta comes out on its own. The uterus continues to contract after the birth and usually then it's expelled.

But if it doesn't come all the way out then the placenta separates and the mom can hemorrhage. That's where you need to make sure that you're getting help. So if the mom is hemorrhaging and you just see blood everywhere, the best thing you can do is put your hand on her tummy, below her belly button and try to massage this lump that's there and that's the uterus, so that the uterus will contract well.

Most people aren't going to feel comfortable doing that because they don't know what a uterus is. But after baby is born if the placenta isn't out yet, the uterus is still moderately big. It's below the belly button. It maybe just feel like a chubby tummy until you rub on it and then it should contract and become a hard ball-like melon size ball and keep massaging it so the uterus can contract. But hopefully someone's called for some help.

Interviewer: Right.

Dr. Jones: But remember women all over the world deliver their baby's by themselves. If it's coming that fast you don't need to put your hands in anywhere.

Now there is the baby coming that fast and its feet first and that's going to be difficult. My guess is if you have absolutely no experience, you should probably let things go and not tug on the feet.

Interviewer: Okay.

Dr. Jones: But if the head comes out first, that's the way it's supposed to and that's the biggest part of the body so if the head can fit, everything else is going to fit. If the feet come out first then the head may not come out and that can be a problem. But an inexperienced person should not be pulling.

Interviewer: So the rule of . . . Keep your hands to yourself still applies?

Dr. Jones: Right. So it's not like pulling a calf. Just put the baby skin to skin next to the mom and hopefully somebody will get in there who knows what they're doing.

Interviewer: So the takeaway is if you are bystander to a delivery, a birth delivery, keep your hands to yourself.

Dr. Jones: Right. Get the mom down on the ground. You can support her shoulders or head. She will push. If it's coming that fast her body will do the right thing. You don't know what size the baby is.

Interviewer: Stay above her head pretty much.

Dr. Jones: So stay above her head and then if someone can keep an eye so that when the baby does come all the way out that you wipe the baby's face a little, you can blow into the baby's face and make sure it takes a little breath. But then put the baby skin to skin next to the mom. The umbilical chord is still attached. Hopefully everything will go okay with the umbilical cord because that's the next risky time. But don't put your hands in there if you don't know what you're doing.

Announcer: TheScopeRadio.com is University of Utah Health Sciences Radio. If you like what you heard, be sure to get our latest content by following us on Facebook. Just click on the Facebook icon at TheScopeRadio.com.

What are the five threats to a woman's health? You might be surprised at what you learn. Today I'll tell you about the five for life, the five most important screenings and tests every woman needs to get and when you should get them.

For a lot of women, their priority is to take care of everyone else; your family, your work, your community, but you neglect taking care of yourself. That's why today I'm going to make it easier by telling you about the five for life. The five most important screenings you need. You should know how you stand on each one of these. Your cholesterol, your pap smear, your mammogram, your colonoscopy and you skin, testing and assessing all these for health is very important and you might be surprised at some of the things you hear.
Screening #1: Cholesterol

Women have always thought that heart disease was a man's disease. But after the age of 70, more women die from heart disease than men. Heart disease is the number one killer of women. And heart disease can be prevented if you control your cholesterol. So you should know what your cholesterol is, it should be tested by the time you're in your 40s and then every five years after that. Preventing high cholesterol or treating high cholesterol can save your heart. So even if you eat right and exercise and do all the things that you know you should do, most of what your cholesterol is doing and why it's doing it comes from your genes. You can do everything right and still have a high cholesterol.
Screening #2: Pap smear

It turns out that pap smears are very cheap, and although women don't like them, very easy to do and no one ever died from a pap smear. Even though you might think you might. Pap smears are, they are to detect cervical cancer. Cervical cancer isn't very common, only about 1 in 100, to 1 in 200 will get it. But it's treatable in its precancerous state and the screening test, a pap smear, picks up cancer before its cancer. So easy test and it's cheap, every woman should get one. Every woman should get one by the time you're 21, and then every couple years, but after you've had 3 normal pap smears you only need to get them every 3 years. Prevent it before it becomes cancer.
Screening #3: Mammogram

Women think that breast cancer is automatically a death sentence and that's not true. Breast cancer, if detected before it's advanced, is very curable and women who have their breast cancers detected by mammography only, no lumps yet, will have a 97% chance of surviving. So if you're going to detect it early you have to get your mammogram. There are controversies about when and how often but suffice it to say that at 50 you should have had a mammogram and then every year to two after that. High risk women, women who have a mom or a sister who've had breast cancer or who've had breast cancer before, should have their mammograms earlier and more often.
Screening #4: Colonoscopy

The Katie Couric test. Did you know that 1 out of 16 women are going to get colon cancer. Now that's actually more common than most people think it would be and colon cancer, like cervical cancer, has a precancerous stage that can be treated before it becomes cancer. So by 50, you should have the colonoscopy. Now it's another test that you don't want to do and it's a private test and it's yucky. However, it's not that bad, they give you some really fun juice to make you not be worried about it and it's much easier than your friends and family have told you.
Screening #5: Skin

Well, you look at your arms and you look at your face, but there are places on your skin that you can't see. And particularly in Utah, where people have been exposed to bright sunlight in the summer, we have more skin cancers as we age. So there are some skin cancers which are very deadly, those dark melanoma skin cancers which should be picked up early. So skin cancer is not a death sentence, in fact, skin cancers are the most common cancers in men and in women, and picked up early they can be removed with minimal surgery, but you have to pick them up, so somebody has to look at your skin and has to look at your skin all over. And that doesn't mean your honey. So your dermatologist should look at your skin.

The most important thing a woman can do about the five for life is, do them. Get a friend, do it together, grab your daughter, grab your mother, spend a day, do them and then go out to lunch, or go out to lunch, oh no, the colonoscopy, you have to get the lunch after the colonoscopy, not before. So get a friend and just make a day of it. Get all five done and then you're done, for at least maybe three years. Once every three years you should take care of yourself, and to do that, you can do the five for life in one half day through University of Utah Health Care, or talk to your doctor about what's appropriate screening for you when you go in for anyone of a number of issues. Say when should I be screened for these five things? The five for life. Your cholesterol, your pap smear, your mammogram, your colonoscopy and your skin screen. The five for life can save your life.

updated: February 7, 2020
originally published: September 25, 2013