The most dreaded complication of vaginal breech delivery is entrapment of the aftercoming head. When this is due to disproportion, persistent attempts at vaginal extraction are likely to result in a dead or damaged baby. A largely unknown solution in this desperate predicament is to surgically enlarge the pelvis by means of a symphysiotomy. A review of the literature shows that symphysiotomy performed to free the trapped aftercoming head will save at least 80% of babies if the procedure is performed without delay. Every obstetrician should be prepared to perform a symphysiotomy if the aftercoming head is trapped.

This retrospective study examined the Caesarean section rates of 15 obstetricians at 1 hospital delivering 5,559 nulliparas with a single cephalic baby of birth-weight > or = 2,500 g. There was a wide variation in obstetricians' Caesarean rates, whether considering all their deliveries (5.5% to 20.1%), deliveries of their own patients (8.9% to 28.2%), or deliveries of their colleagues' patients (4.5% to 17.9%). There was no relation between Caesarean rates and perinatal outcome. The different Caesarean section rates among the obstetricians could not be explained by institutional factors, physician convenience, patient differences, or self-serving economic incentives.