Caffeine in the Second Stage: A Randomized Control Trial in Low-risk Nulliparous Mothers at Term

Patients will present to the Women's Health Center as part of their prenatal visits or to Labor and Delivery for induction of labor or in spontaneous labor. Starting at 36 weeks gestation in the clinic or upon arrival to the labor floor, the inclusion criteria specified above will be applied by the OB Resident. Upon meeting criteria, the OB Resident will speak to the patient and gather any information typically needed for their visit/admission. Upon conclusion of the visit/admission, the OB Resident will discuss the consent form with the patient and inquire about interest to participate in the study. If interested in participation, the consent form will be signed by the patient, the resident, and a witness. At that time the patient will be designated a number for tracking purposes and a caffeine food frequency questionnaire will be completed. Patients who are involved in the study will have their problem list updated for tracking and will be designated on the labor board at time of arrival to maintain continuity of care within and across shifts. At time of arrival to the labor floor the OB resident with confirm desire to proceed with the study and record caffeine intake on the day of admission. Based on the previously assigned number, the patient will be placed into the treatment or placebo arm based upon a randomization schedule held by the OB resident team. At the time of labor, patient management will take place by the OB team with no impact by study involvement. At the time the patient is noted to be 10 cm dilated administration of either 500 cc normal saline (NS) or 250 mg of caffeine sodium benzoate (125 mg caffeine, 125 mg sodium benzoate) in 500 cc NS over 2 hours at a rate of 250 ml/hr will be performed. The time the intervention is given will be annotated on the labor board. The solutions will be kept in the hospital pharmacy and will be sent to the labor floor upon placement of the order in epic by the OB resident. The length of the second stage as well as the time and method of delivery, indication, blood loss and fetal APGARs will be documented in EPIC as part of the normal flow of documentation. All data will be extrapolated from EPIC, de-identified and stored in REDCap for organization and application of data analysis.

The intent of this project is to utilize a well-studied substance with the potential to improve cognitive and physiologic performance in a novel setting for a population that has a baseline risk for morbidity. The length of the overall labor process often results in a state of exhaustion for mothers prior to being required to spend potentially 2-4 hours actively pushing. The provision of caffeine may improve energy, mood and physiologic performance and reduce the incidence of operative deliveries, shorten the second stage of labor and reduce maternal blood loss. If the results of this study are demonstrated to be significant, the administration of caffeine is a low-risk intervention that may be considered for implementation across populations and potentially reduce maternal morbidity worldwide.