15 Terms

Question 1

Pitting Edema

Answer 1

A form of severe edema where, if the skin is depressed with a finger, a depression will remain for a short period after the finger is released.

Question 2

Plasma

Answer 2

The watery, straw colored fluid within the blood that contains leukocytes, erythrocytes and platelets.

Question 3

Polyhydramnios

Answer 3

Excessive levels of amniotic fluid

Question 4

Posterior

Answer 4

To the rear or back. Used to describe the position the baby is lying in if the baby is facing the mother’s spine inside the uterus.

Question 5

Prolactin

Answer 5

A hormone produced by the anterior pituitary gland that stimulates breast milk production

Question 6

Rectum

Answer 6

Passage from the intestine from where the feces leave the body

Question 7

Regional Anesthesia

Answer 7

A form of anesthesia where a local anesthetic is injected into a specific area to block a group of nerve fibers. In obstetrics, epidural and spinal anesthesia is a commonly used form of regional anesthesia

Question 8

Respiratory

Answer 8

Referring to the lungs and their function, or breathing

Question 9

Saline

Answer 9

A substance that contains salt. Can be used to counteract forms of dehydration

Question 10

Somatic Nervous System

Answer 10

Part of the peripheral nerous system. The somatic nervous system controls voluntary muscle like skeletal mescle, and the external sensory receptors like the skin. Blinking in bright lights and the leg jerking after th eknee is tapped with a hammer are examples of a sensory nervous system response

Question 11

Stress hormones

Answer 11

Hormones that are released as a response to a stressful event, also referred to as “flight or fight hormones”

Question 12

Sympathetic Nervous System

Answer 12

The sympathetic nervous system is part of the autonomic nervous system. When the sympathetic nervous system is simulated it results in an increase in heart rate, dilation of the pupils, an increase in blood pressure, slowing down of the gastrointestinal tracts, and diversion of blood away from the skin and towards the skeletal muscles, brain, and heart. This nervous system is stimulated when a person is anxious or afraid. IT is also called the fight or flight response.

Question 13

Tachycardia

Answer 13

An abnormally high, or elevated, heart rate. In a fetus it would generally be considered a heart rate of more than 160 beats per minute for more than 10 minutes.

Question 14

Twilight Sleep

Answer 14

A form of anesthesia popular in the first half of the 20th century in obstetrics. Scopoloamine and morphine where injected into the mother to induce a state of amnesia and unconsciousness. The theory was that women could give birth without remembering and without being in any pain. The major side fects wer the lack of memory the mother had about her birth and the effect on the newborn baby’s respiratory system.

Question 15

Somnolence

Answer 15

Drowsiness