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Storm Gives New Life To Birthing Myths
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Published: August 21, 2008
Updated: 08/21/2008 12:44 am
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TAMPA - An enduring superstition says a full moon sends pregnant women into labor.
Same thing happens when a big storm is on the way, or so it goes.
Urban myth? Fact? Who knows. But consider this: Labor and delivery nurses think it's true.
Early this week, as the full moon rose and Tropical Storm Fay sneaked up the Gulf Coast, at least one major hospital in Tampa saw a spooky number of women in labor waddle their way through the hospital doors.
"We just had this stream of women coming in all the sudden," said Pam Malone-Quarles, interim manager of the delivery ward at St. Joseph's Women's Hospital, the busiest baby delivery hospital in Tampa, with 7,500 births in 2007. "It happens all the time. You're driving in to work for a night shift, and you see the full moon and you just know it's going to be crazy."
The nursing staff at St. Joseph's took a cursory look at the charts and found a pattern. About a week ago, on Aug. 10 and 11 (a Sunday and Monday), the hospital saw 29 babies born.
Then a week later, again on Sunday and Monday, with a full moon and the storm, there were 41 babies. The difference for the two Sundays (five versus 11) was especially interesting because few doctors schedule deliveries for a weekend, meaning those deliveries most likely came naturally.
The hospital did not have information available on how many of the births were scheduled.
Like all good superstitions, there's not enough hard evidence to prove anything either way - just enough to make you wonder.
With storms, the quasimedical theory goes like this: Nearing delivery day, pressure starts to build in the amniotic fluid in the womb. As a storm nears, the barometric pressure can drop quickly. The sudden shift pops the amniotic sack, sending women to the hospital. Some medical studies found real evidence for that theory.
The moon cycle theory is a bit stranger. Maybe the lunar light triggers some instinctive reaction in women. Or perhaps the moon's gravitational pull - strong enough to produce tides on oceans - makes a similar tug on women's wombs.
Takita Cox thinks that's possible.
She was due to deliver her sixth baby Sept. 4. That didn't happen. She was outside Monday night and spotted the full moon. "We live way out in the country, and we see all kinds of weird things out there," she said. A few hours later, she went into labor and delivered Xavier Cox at 2:25 p.m. Tuesday, all 7 pounds, 20 inches of him.
Jill Hechtman, a specialist in obstetrics and gynecology and medical director of Tampa Obstetrics in Tampa, said she believes the storm theory, though maybe not the moon cycle theory.
Don't get her started about the Fourth of July.
"The booms and the noise of the fireworks - that does it," said Hechtman, who bases her hypothesis on all the holidays she's had to work in her career. She suspects the shock waves from the fireworks can rattle and break the bag of amniotic fluid, sending women to the hospital.
Sure, there's plenty of reason for skepticism.
Tampa General Hospital saw no major rush of babies this week, though its delivery volume is smaller than St. Joseph's.
Morton Plant Hospital in Clearwater and Mease Countryside Hospital in Safety Harbor also saw no noticeable bump in baby deliveries.
Medical journals are mixed on the issue, with a few intriguing studies favoring the myths.
French researchers reviewed dates of 5.9 million births from January 1968 through December 1974. They found distinct trends: a weekly pattern that saw fewer babies on Sundays and more on Tuesdays; an annual rhythm that saw the fewest babies in September-October and the most in May. It also found a distinct pattern that followed the lunar cycle, with fewer babies born under a new moon and more as full moons glowed.
A study published in 1998 looked at 1,200 spontaneous, full-term deliveries and found a statistically significant bump in deliveries in the first or second day after the full moon.
Other studies call that bunk. The American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology published two studies that compared birth dates, lunar cycles, temperature, dew point and barometric pressure. It noted that past research is all over the map because scientists disagreed about what to call a "full" moon, when to mark the beginning of "labor," etc., etc. Their conclusions: There's no link. Neither the moon nor storms trigger labor. But belief in the myth "persists today among many educated people."
As for Tropical Storm Fay, it did leave one significant event behind: a baby born at Tampa General Hospital named Fay, said spokeswoman Ellen Fiss. "But that was a baby named Fay after a mother-in-law."
Reporter Richard Mullins can be reached at rmullins@tampatrib.com or (813) 259-7919.
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