Pain experience and the amount of analgesics needed during labor were studied in 32 primiparous women who had received repeated treatment with acupuncture (AP) during the month prior to term and in 16 nontreated primiparous women. The women’s psychological profiles were evaluated by a psychiatric interview at week 38 of pregnancy. Treatment with AP did not reduce the need for analgesics in labor. During labor, all women experienced successively rising pain irrespective of whether or not they had been treated with AP prior to labor or delivered under local anesthesia. Experience of pain was not reduced in subjective assessments in women treated with AP. There was a strong correlation between assessments of pain made during labor and 6 months after delivery. In the group that did not receive AP, cerebrospinal fluid dynorphin A was significantly lower in parturients who chose epidural anesthesia.

Acupuncture treatment in the final weeks of pregnancy has been claimed to shorten the duration of labor in primiparous women. In the present study, the length of the various phases of labor was calculated for 56 primiparous women who were repeatedly treated with manual acupuncture during the month prior to parturition. In vaginally delivering women, the average lengths of the latent and active phase and the second stage of labor were 4.1, 3.4 and 1.4 h, respectively. In a nontreated control group of 112 primiparous women, the corresponding durations were 4.4, 3.5 and 1.1 h. Acupuncture treatment before delivery did not shorten the delivery time. Instead, acupuncture seemed to lengthen pregnancy and to prolong labor, for there was a positive correlation between the number of acupuncture treatments given and the length of gestation, second-stage labor and total delivery time. Based on the results of the present study, it appears possible that the effect of acupuncture is the opposite to that suggested by others, i.e. it lengthens the pregnancy as well as delivery time and does not reduce the duration of labor.

Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) levels of dynorphin A and \g=b\-endorphin were measured by radioimmunoassay in 62 primiparae in term pregnancy before onset of labour. In 50 of these women acupuncture (AP) treatment was given in an antenatal preparation procedure. In 15 of the AP-treated women, CSF samples were further obtained six months after delivery. Median values for dynorphin A were 7.5 pmol/l in AP-treated women and 6.4 pmol/l in non-treated controls. The puerperal median value for dynorphin A was 7.6 pmol/l. Median values for \g=b\-endorphin were 7.1 pmol/l in AP-treated women and 5.7 pmol/l in non\x=req-\ treated controls. The median \g=b\-endorphin value after delivery was 7.3 pmol/l. There was no significant difference in CSF dynorphin A or \g=b\-endorphin levels between the AP-treated women and non-treated controls in late pregnancy. Consequently, the present study does not support the theory of a positive influence on either the dynorphin or the \g=b\-endorphinsystem by manual AP. Within subject comparisons of dynorphin\x=req-\ A and \g=b\-endorphin failed to indicate any significant trend in samples obtained in late pregnancy and 6 months after delivery, and there was no increased activity in either the dynorphin or the \g=b\-endorphin system in late pregnancy, as reflected by CSF levels.

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