When is it Necessary to Deliver a Baby by Cesarean Section?

My younger sister has two children, aged 29 and 25. Both are boys, and both were delivered by cesarean section. She had wanted a third child - a girl, she had hoped - but her particular condition prevented her from realizing that dream. Her attending physician recommended that her first boy be delivered by cesarean section because she was then having a prolonged labor. Under the same obstetrician, her second boy was delivered likewise by cesarean section, largely because of that similar surgery four years earlier.

The second delivery by cesarean section is quite comprehendible; but someone asked my sister if it was possible for her to have avoided the cesarean section on her first delivery, given her condition then of having a prolonged labor, by means of any medical method of inducing normal delivery. It was clearly explained by her doctor that a normal delivery was very risky for her at that time since her condition was made even more precarious by her having elevated blood pressure.

So when is it necessary to deliver a baby by cesarean section? There are actually a number of answers to this question. The attending physician may recommend performing cesarean section (the surgical removal of a baby from the womb through an incision made in the mother's lower abdomen and in her uterus) if, in her professional opinion, it isn't possible, or isn't safe, for a baby to be delivered normally through the mother's birth canal.

Doctors have identified certain conditions that make vaginal (or normal) delivery risky. Maternal health problems, such as heart disease, diabetes, HIV, and herpes, are some of the conditions that will necessitate delivery of a baby by cesarean section.