I read that the birth assistant will usually get the woman up onto her hands and knees and will sometimes keep a hand inside the vagina trying to keep the pressure off of the cord or the cord out of the way or something like that. I wasn't entirely clear on what they would be trying to do at that point. But all of this was basically while they were waiting for the C-section to take place.
My question is about what happens if no hospital is available and there's no way to perform a C-section. Is there anything the birth assistant can do to help the baby at that point? Clearly, if there's no way to do a section, the baby will have to come out vaginally, but is there any way to increase its odds of being born alive? If so, what are the odds of it being helpful? Would the birth assistant actually be hopeful that it might help, or would it be more of an against-all-odds, have-to-try-something sort of attempt?
Would resuscitation be especially helpful after the baby is out? Would you be able to tell just at a glance whether the baby could still be helped or if it was totally gone? They would probably try CPR regardless just so that they knew they tried everything they could, but I want to know what would be going through their heads. Would there still be hope?
Also, am I correct in assuming that only the child is in danger from this? Is the mother in any sort of physical danger at this point?
In this case, the birth assistant is someone with a fair amount of knowledge and some experience. He's assisted deliveries before, but only healthy normal ones, never anything with severe complications.
