Objectives

Vaginal breech deliveries are high‐risk events and as such it is especially important to council these
patients clearly on modes of delivery and to ensure that RCOG standards are complied with carefully.
With recent history demonstrating a general reduction in vaginal breech deliveries and increase in
caesarean section rates, it seemed prudent to assess our maternity unit's outcomes for different
methods of delivering breech presentation and how effectively we adhere to national guidance.

Method

Data regarding breech presentations were retrospectively collected between August 2017 and August
2018; these data were collected from our Badgernet online system. Management and outcome data
were broadly collected for each delivery, and compliance with RCOG guidelines regarding external
cephalic version (ECV), location of delivery, and use of syntocinon was also assessed.

Results

55% of breech deliveries were unassisted vaginal deliveries. Our findings suggest increased short‐term
fetal morbidity with 4 cases (11%) going to the Neonatal Unit; however, there were no long‐term fetal
issues. There were no serious maternal complications following any of the vaginal breech deliveries.
Problems relating to high estimated blood loss and other maternal complications were primarily an issue
with caesarean sections. Our unit was compliant with RCOG standards.

Conclusions

Our results suggest that we should carry on with our current safe practise. Patient counselling is
paramount and we will ensure that patients have access to updated information; part of this effort will
be ensuring that updated literature is available to women who also do not speak English.