Clamping umbilical cords

[sharonx]

Looking to see how umbilical cord clamping is handle at other L&D hospitals. The doctors have always clamped with hemostats and then handed the newborn to the nursery nurse where she placed the clamp on the infant under the warmer. Now we do immediate to the mother's abdomen then skin to skin as soon as possible. The docs leave the hemostat dangling while the infant is given the immediate care needed, and then it is very difficult for the nurse to get safely in position to clamp and cut. There are usually many people directly at the bedside and the positioning of the infant makes handling and visualization a problem. I think the hemostat can cause serious harm to a newborn if it comes intact with the infant. Any insights would be helpful. Thanks. Any evidence-base information would be great!

[cayenne06, MSN, CNM]

If it's not convenient to clamp at the umbilicus, I usually clamp long with a plastic cord clamp when the cord has stopped pulsating, then the nurse trims it up whenever convenient, sometimes while baby is still hanging with mom, and sometimes not until an hour or two after birth, depending on the circumstance. Ive clamped long with a hemostat when the circumstances dictated, but it is clunky and annoying and could pull on the umbilicus if you aren't careful.