Inducing labour at 41 weeks may be safer than “wait and see” approach, study finds

Inducing labour at 41 weeks rather than waiting until 42 weeks may be safer in low risk pregnancies, a study has found.1

The researchers recommended that their results should be “interpreted cautiously” but that pregnant women should be told the risks of expectant management and be offered induction at 41 weeks. Current practice in the UK and Scandinavia is to induce delivery in all women who have not gone into labour by 42 weeks.

The SWEdish Post-term Induction Study (SWEPIS) study, published in The BMJ,1 included 2760 women with a low risk uncomplicated pregnancy treated at 14 hospitals in Sweden in 2016-18 …