Use of computers in the labor and delivery suite: an overview.

Some simple computers for fetal monitoring are already commercially available. These systems are designed to alarm when abnormalities reflected by the fetal heart are detected during labor. Unfortunately, the problems of fetal heart rate/intrauterine pressure data analysis have been oversimplified. An "ideal" obstetric computer-based data management system would begin, as the clinician should, with the assessment of risk from the patient's past history, pregnancy course, and labor progress as a basis for analyzing the condition of the fetus during labor. Systems available now are of limited scope, expensive, and of unproved clinical value. Premature attempts at clinical computerization will accomplish little, except to give computers a bad name. Let the buyer beware!