MUMS-to-be having their babies at the John Radcliffe Hospital Women's Centre can now be upright and mobile during labour while their baby is being monitored.

Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (OUH) has become the only centre in the Thames Valley to offer wireless baby heart monitoring to all women on its delivery suite.

The trust has received 15 new telemetry/mobile electronic fetal monitors (EFM) - one for each birthing room.

Consultant Midwife at the trust, Wendy Randall, said: "Being active during labour is very important as gravity plays a vital role in childbirth; additionally by being upright and mobile women's experience of pain is greatly reduced.

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"These new wireless machines are also waterproof which means that women can use the pool or shower with the reassurance of having their baby's heart rate monitored."

For some women it is important to have a fuller assessment of the baby's heart rate during labour and recommended the baby's heart rate in continuously monitored.

This produces a visual picture of how the baby is responding to labour and can alert the midwife to how the baby is tolerating the contractions.

The heart rate monitoring is performed by attaching wide stretchy bands that hold two electronic disks to the woman's abdomen.