Pain relief in labor, anesthesia for a cesarean, and what you are owed if it is not working.
Understand before you consent.
Anesthesia is the part of birth people plan for least and remember longest. This class prepares you for the choices about pain relief, for what happens in an operating room, and for the decisions that arise when an anesthetic does not work as well as everyone hoped.
It covers labor pain and what relieves it, the epidural in detail, how a cesarean is anesthetized, pain during the operation, and what the team owes you when you report it. Begin with the Essential Classes. Use the Complete Evidence Library whenever you need more detail.
This resource supports informed conversations. Completing a lesson does not constitute consent to treatment and does not replace individualized clinical counseling.
Preventive ethics means addressing foreseeable risks, decisions, and limits of medicine before urgency, pain, fear, or deterioration makes meaningful discussion difficult.
The three classes
Seven modules. Five to six minutes each. Take them in order, or start where you are.
The essential classesWhat every expectant parent should understand about anesthesia, in a curriculum you can finish.
7 modules
The Evidence LibraryThe next question, in greater depth, with the sources behind every claim.
40 topics · 70 sources
More
About this program. Written by Amos Grünebaum, MD — obstetrician and maternal-fetal medicine specialist, fifty years in practice. Preparation is the responsibility of the maternity system and of every clinician involved in your care, the anesthesia team included. This program supports that responsibility; it does not transfer it entirely to you.
Essential Classes
Three classes, seven modules. Every module follows the same nine-part structure, so you always know what you are being told and what is still uncertain.
Completing a class is not consent. Your progress record documents what you reviewed. It does not establish capacity, voluntariness, understanding, or consent to any specific intervention.
Where are you now?
Choosing a stage moves the most relevant modules to the top. Nothing is hidden, and nothing is locked. You can change this at any time.
Prepare for my next visit
Bring a short, ordered list rather than a long one. Below are the questions you saved, the modules you have not opened yet for your stage, and a printable page.
Search
Search in your own words. “Water broke early”, “pain during C-section” and “baby taken away” all find the right pages.
Complete Evidence Library
Four hundred and fifty-seven important questions, decisions, procedures, and possible events, each with the sources behind it. The classes teach what every expectant parent should understand. The library answers the next question in greater depth.
A-to-Z index
Every topic in the library, alphabetically.
Sources
Every claim in the Evidence Library is numbered to one of these. Guidelines, trials, systematic reviews and national data.
My questions
Questions you saved from the lessons and the library, plus anything you add yourself. Mark a question as discussed once you have raised it.
My progress and preparedness record
A dated record of what you reviewed, what you asked, and what still needs a conversation.
