Investigators designed this prospective interventional study to determine if morbid obesity would influence DPE technique regarding labor analgesia onset and block characteristics.
Recently, the dural puncture epidural (DPE) technique has emerged as a novel method of labor analgesia. The DPE technique is a modification of the combined spinal epidural (CSE) technique, where a dural perforation is created from a spinal needle but intrathecal medication administration is withheld. The DPE technique has been shown to improve caudal spread of analgesia compared with epidural technique without the side effects observed with the CSE technique.