Synthetic oxytocin, sold under the brand name Pitocin among others, is a medication made from the peptide oxytocin. As a medication, it is used to cause contraction of the uterus to start labor, increase the speed of labor, and to stop bleeding following delivery. For this purpose, it is given by injection either into a muscle or into a vein.Oxytocin is also available in intranasal spray form for psychiatric, endocrine and weight management use as a supplement. Intranasal oxytocin works on a different pathway than injected oxytocin, primarily along the olfactory nerve crossing the brain blood barrier to the olfactory lobe in the brain, where dense magnocellular oxytocin neurons receive the dose application. The use of synthetic oxytocin as an injectable medication for inducing childbirth can result in excessive contraction of the uterus that can risk the health of the baby. Common side effects in the mother include nausea and a slow heart rate. Serious side effects include rupture of the uterus and with excessive dose, water intoxication. Allergic reactions including anaphylaxis may also occur.The natural occurrence of oxytocin was discovered in 1906. It is on the World Health Organizations List of Essential Medicines. Medical uses
An intravenous infusion of oxytocin is used to induce labor and to support labor in case of slow childbirth if the oxytocin challenge test fails. Whether a high dose is better than a standard dose for labor induction is unclear. It has largely replaced ergometrine as the principal agent to increase uterine tone in acute postpartum hemorrhage.
Couvade is a term which was coined by anthropologist E. B. Tylor in 1865 to refer to certain rituals in several cultures that fathers adopt during pregnancy. Couvade can be traced to Ancient Egypt as a "sacred birth custom, of when a child is born, the man experiences the ritual of "labor" in which he takes to his bed, and undergoes periods of fasting and purification, and the observance of certain taboos".The term "couvade" is borrowed from French (where it is derived from the verb couver "to brood, hatch"); the use in the modern sense derives from a misunderstanding of an earlier idiom faire la couvade, which meant "to sit doing nothing. "An example of couvade is that the Cantabri people had a custom in which the father, during or immediately after the birth of a child, took to bed, complained of having labour pains, and was accorded the treatment usually shown to women during pregnancy or after childbirth. Similarly, in Papua New Guinea, fathers built a hut outside the village and mimicked the pains of labour until the baby is born. Similar rituals occur in other cultural groups in Thailand, Russia, China, India and many indigenous groups in the Americas. In some cultures, "sympathetic pregnancy" is attributed to efforts to ward off demons or spirits from the mother or seek favour of supernatural beings for the child. Couvade has been reported by travelers throughout history, including the Greek geographer Strabo (3.4.17).