Planning to be Induced..what happens?

They'll probably do an internal to see what's happening with your cervix. This gives them a Bishop's score and if your score is under a certain number, they will give internal gel (they can do this twice in a 24 hour period). But, if it's over a certain number (I think it's about 6), they might either (a) break your waters if they can and see if that works and/or (b) start you on Syntocinin IV to get the uterus contracting. The reason they do the Bishop's score is that it can be predictive of induction success. If you have a low Bishop's score and they go straight to syntocinin, it's much less likely to work.

In my case, I went in, had an internal and CTG. They gave me prostaglandin gel internally. They kept me on the CTG for an hour (and on bed rest) and then I could go and move around. They checked the CTG every 2 hours and did regular internals. Mine took 4 days, so had round the clock CTGs and 2x gel applications each day. The last day my Bishop's score (and cervix) had got to the stage where they could break my waters. That didn't start labour so they then put syntocinon on. I also had an epidural cos the synto contractions are regular and close together (and they wanted to have mine at a high dose so the baby would come out).

There's lots of threads on here about induction, just do a search.

Good luck!

I was induced...um was told to be at hospital at 7.30pm. Got hooked up to monitor for an hour or so to check everything out. Doctor finally came and applied gel at 11.30pm (wish I had gone to sleep while waiting lol). Labour came on very strong at 3.30am, dilated from 1-7 cm in an hour Waters broke at 6.20am and I had my wee boy at 7.50am. No epi, or other assistance required. Short and sharp and done

I was induced at 39 weeks with lil miss by request (I had hyperemesis). First I had to get my midwife to agree, then I had to see a consultant at the hospital and get them to sign off on it, then my midwife booked an induction slot. Because it was an elective induction, if another more urgent case had come up, I would have been bumped back.

They also gave me the usual lecture about the cascade of intervention (induction leading to intervention/c-sect) but in the end it was less than 3 hours from the time my waters were broken until she was born, and my official "labour" was only 1hr45min.