Birthing gloove

Abstract

A birthing glove exposes portions of the finger and thumb, which may be covered by a regular surgical glove. The birthing glove has a trank having an inner wall covering the palm and backhand of the birthing practitioner. Four finger sleeves and a thumb sleeve extend from the trank and terminate over the first phalanx of each finger. A cuff extends from the trank for covering at least a portion of the practitioner's forearm and an inflatable bladder is disposed over the inner wall of the trank adjacent to the back of the hand for inflation in order to expand behind the exposed fingers and thumb of the practitioner in order to dilate the birth canal and provide access to the head of the infant.

Description

RELATED APPLICATION[0001]This application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10 / 196,255 filed Jul. 17, 2002, incorporated herein in its entirety.FIELD OF THE INVENTION[0002]The present invention relates to birthing gloves. More particularly, the present invention relates to a birthing gloves which facilitate passage of an infant through a birthing canal.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0003]A current practice by obstetricians is to utilize obstetric forceps for grasping a baby's head during childbirth. Generally, obstetric forceps have metal elements which are used to grasp a baby's head and assist in the birth by pulling on the forceps to extract the infant through the birth canal and out of the mother's body.[0004]With obstetric forceps there is a risk of injury to a baby's head, the injury ranging from nerve damage to impression fractures of the skull caused by excessive pressure applied by the forceps to the infants head during delivery. The pressure on an ...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0010]In still a further aspect of the birthing glove, a bladder extends only over the back side of the metacarpal with no sufficient over the palm of the hand to allow flexibility of the metacarpus when the hand is inserted through the birth canal.

Problems solved by technology

With obstetric forceps there is a risk of injury to a baby's head, the injury ranging from nerve damage to impression fractures of the skull caused by excessive pressure applied by the forceps to the infants head during delivery.

The pressure on an infant's head is not adequately controllable because the obstetrician must rely on finger sensitivity which is displaced from the baby by the length of the forceps.

Moreover, obstetric forceps have a particular shape whereas baby's heads have different shapes so that situations arise where pressure is applied at inappropriate locations on the infant's head at excessive levels.

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