NCT01278979

Diagnosing Perineal Tears, Does Different Assessment Methods Affect the Midwife's Clinical Judgement of Perineal Tears?

Diagnosing Perineal Tears. Consistency in Midwifes Clinical Judgement When Assessing Perineal Tears Using Two Different Assessment Methods.

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 400 (actual)
• Sponsor: Ostfold Hospital Trust · Academic / Other
• Sex: Female
• Age: 18 Years – 55 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

This study aims to compare different midwife practitioners assessments of perineal tears.

Detailed description

Perineal injuries are one of the traumas most frequently suffered by women during delivery.Countries report wide variations in trauma rates, and within countries further variations exists among institutions and also among professional groups of caregivers.Visual and digital examination of the wound has been and is the most common way to assess and classify a perineal tear. However resent studies indicate that many tears diagnosed with this method are misclassified.The suggested reasons for this, apart from the fact that bleeding and tissue oedema make the diagnose difficult, is that many healthcare providers have too little training in perineal assessment and basic anatomy. In this prospective randomised trial consenting women will be randomised in to the common visual and digital assessment of the perineal tear by to different midwives, blinded to each others assessment or visual and digital assessment and measuring of the tear with a small soft ruler, Peri-Rule also by two different midwives.

Conditions

• Obstetric Perineal Rupture

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
DEVICE	Objective measurements of perineal tears with "Peri-Rule"	Four measurements will be used in this study. 1. Depth of tear, from the fourchette into the greatest depth of the perineal body. 2. Length of tear, from the fourchette to the apex of the vaginal tear. 3. Length of tear, from the fourchette along perineal skin towards the anus. 4. Length of the perineal body, from the fourchette to outer margin of anus.
OTHER	Visual and digital assessment	Midwifes assessing perineal tears as standard procedure with visual and digital examination of the perineal tear.

Timeline

• Start date: 2011-01-01
• Primary completion: 2012-06-01
• Completion: 2013-02-01
• First posted: 2011-01-19
• Last updated: 2013-05-21

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Norway