Statistical aspects of modeling the labor curve

Abstract

In a recent review by Cohen and Friedman, several statistical questions on modeling labor curves were raised. This article illustrates that asking data to fit a preconceived model or letting a sufficiently flexible model fit observed data is the main difference in principles of statistical modeling between the original Friedman curve and our average labor curve. An evidence-based approach to construct a labor curve and establish normal values should allow the statistical model to fit observed data. In addition, the presence of the deceleration phase in the active phase of an average labor curve was questioned. Forcing a deceleration phase to be part of the labor curve may have artificially raised the speed of progression in the active phase with a particularly large impact on earlier labor between 4 and 6 cm. Finally, any labor curve is illustrative and may not be instructive in managing labor because of variations in individual labor pattern and large errors in measuring cervical dilation. With the tools commonly available, it may be more productive to establish a new partogram that takes the physiology of labor and contemporary obstetric population into account.

Keywords: Friedman curve; deceleration phase; labor curve; modeling; partogram.