You are to be on the first floor, labor and delivery (L&D) at 6:00 a.m. to round with residents and faculty. The chief resident will assign you patients. You will be discussing cases that you will then evaluate. The resident will assist you.
Morning rounds generally last from 7:00 a.m to 8:30 a.m. on the first floor with the OB team and attending. You will then round on postpartum patients. You will stay on L&D for deliveries until 6:00 p.m. While on L&D, you and the resident will evaluate patients in the triage area, the labor-delivery-recovery (LDR) rooms or the postpartum ward.
You will obtain histories and perform physical exams prior to the residents seeing the patients, as well as cervical and sterile speculum exams with the resident. You may observe invasive procedures that the resident performs (e.g. artificial rupture of membranes, fetal scalp electrode or intrauterine pressure catheter placement).
You may attend and participate in deliveries (vaginal and Cesarean—yes, you will deliver babies!) with the resident. Please note that you are not allowed to perform invasive procedures or vaginal deliveries without a faculty or upper-level resident physician present. You or the resident should seek the permission of the private OB physicians if you wish to participate in their patients' evaluations, care and deliveries. Again, the resident will assist you in all of these activities.
While there is no “overnight” call for you on L&D, we do encourage you to stay a bit late, if there is a patient you have been following who is going to deliver later in the evening. (There is no sense in working all day and not seeing the fruits of “your” labor!)