The nurse and mother ; a manual for the guidance of monthly nurses and mothers.

  • Coles, Walter, 1839-1892.
Date:
1881
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The nurse and mother ; a manual for the guidance of monthly nurses and mothers. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

    34/162 (page 30)
    Immediately before labor, physicians are sometimes able to make a pretty correct guess as to tlie sex of the child by the character of its heart-beats; outside of this, (which requires a good deal of experience) there is no sure way of judging or predicting what the sex will prove to be. Many, and some very excellent nurses, pro- fess to form conclusions on this point by the peculiar symptoms experienced during preg- nancy, or by the manner in which the woman ''carries her cliild.^^ that is, by the shape of the abdomen. But this is entirely dependent upon the position of tlie child, which may vary with either sex, and may not be precisely alike in any two pregnancies ; consequently there is abso- lutely nothing in these circumstances upon which any person would be justified in forming an opinion. Those persons, therefore, who rest their predictions on such signs as these, sim- ply evince their ignorance, and nothing else. It is true that a physician can sometimes tell by a minute examination of the abdomen of the mother, what part of the child will present, or be born first, and possibly, whether there are twins, but no one should be foolish enough to predict the sex on any such indication.