Epidurals - What are the risks? She is a twenty-year-old newlywed, pregnant with her second child. She wants what's best for her family, especially the unborn child within her, but she's not exactly sure what questions to ask, let alone the consequences of her decisions. The doctor's voice rings out again awakening her from her internal struggle: "Do you think you would like to receive medications during the birth process or would you like to take a more natural approach?" She looks back at her husband, whose blank stare has become all too familiar during these doctor visits. This was the encounter I had during pre-birth counseling. While I am confident that the information I received was knowledgeable and honest, I am equally confident that I was not aware of all of my options and the consequences resulting from each of them. While every mother wants what is best for her unborn child, many women in labor are uninformed about the epidural they consent to and what it does or can do to themselves and their baby. Women have been giving birth since the beginning of time and yet only in the last few decades has it been possible to relieve pain during childbirth. According to a British medical journal, as late as 1946, women were using labor drugs, including chloroform and nitrous oxide, as painkillers. Even then, 68% of women opted for no painkillers at all. Twelve years later, that rate was halved to just 34 percent of births without pain relief. In 1990, there were no records of women going through labor without any pain relief. These statistics were based on the experiences of 10,000 women who had given birth in Britain during one week of that particular decade. As previously stated, in 1946, chloroform and nitrous oxide were the most popular painkillers. Chloroform is no longer used due to its toxicity. In 1958 the pain relief drug choices were nitrous oxide, trilene, which is short for trichlorethylene, and pethidine, better known as Demerol. Trilene was a drug that was inhaled and was eventually taken off the market due to negative side effects. Pethidine reached its greatest popularity between 1958 and 1970 and is now used less. While nitrous oxide is a mainstay, epidurals are becoming increasingly popular.