[2][3][4] The UK National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) Guidelines recommend against the use of amnioinfusion in women with meconium stained amniotic fluid (MSAF).
[6] Amnioinfusion can be complicated by premature rupture of membranes, intrauterine infection, maternal pulmonary embolus, puncture and hemorrhage of umbilical cord, precipitous labor, and placental abruption.
[6] Amnioinfusion was initially performed as a means of achieving first- and second-trimester abortion through the infusion of formalin and hypertonic glucose.
Due to its high risk for infection, hemorrhage, and retained placental tissue leading to a roughly 10% mortality rate, amnioinfusion was largely replaced by prostaglandin medications for performing abortions in the 1980s.
[15] The first report of using isotonic saline or Lactated Ringers solution for repeated late decelerations on fetal heart tracing was in 1983 using either a spinal needle or transcervical catheter.