In my hospital when I have an RH negative woman, I am required to send her blood for type and RH and Coombs after the birth, in addition to the baby's cord blood. As most of my births are non-interventive my moms don't usually have hep locks or IVs so I don't take their blood. I also hate to have to stick them after the birth and to turn such a natural birth into a medical business. So my less interventive way to get the blood is to use the outer part of a sterile 20 cc syringe after I have discarded the inner plunger, and place it at the entroitus. When I place my other hand on her fundus to check if it is well contracted, usually I can catch a spurt of at least 2-5cc of mother's blood which I then transfer to a test tube and send off to lab. Of course I have a finger on the hole at the bottom of the syringe so the blood doesn't run off. I've been using this trick for years instead of pricking the mom. It works great--try it!
-I. S.
Reprinted from Midwifery Today E-News (Vol 1 Issue 46, Nov 12, 1999)
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