The Apparatus for Facilitating Childbirth by Centrifugal Force

No, no one can make this stuff up. Not even me.

I did promise at the beginning of this journey that I might not be doing the entire history of childbirth in order. You see, some things are just so funny that you have to share them when you find them.

The Engineer was doing some research about CPAP in premature babies for a project at school. How he found this in the process is beyond me, but he just KNEW I’d love it. So Soranus has to wait another week.

In 1963, the US Patent Office granted a patent to Dr. George Blonsky, an obstetrician, and his wife Charlotte, a one-time medical student, for this marvelous device.

The preface reads:

“It is known, that due to natural anatomical conditions, the fetus needs the application of considerable propelling force to enable it to push aside the constricting vaginal surfaces and to counteract the atmospheric pressure opposing the emergence of the child. In the case of a woman who has a fully developed muscular system and has had ample physical exertion all through the pregnancy, as is common with all the more primitive peoples, nature provides all the necessary equipment and power to have a normal and quick delivery. This is not the case, however, with more civilized women who often do not have the opportunity to develop the muscles needed in confinement.

“It is the primary purpose of the present invention to provide an apparatus which will assist the under-equipped woman by creating a gentle, evenly distributed, properly directed, precision-controlled force, that acts in unison with and supplements her own efforts.”

I’ve been looking for any evidence that this device was ever built, tested, FDA approved for medical device indications, or even a record of any actual use on a human. Medline doesn’t go back that far, so absent hours in the local medical library doing it the old fashioned  way, I’m just going to guess, um, NO.

Even if they built it, WHO WOULD COME?

We let our obstetricians strap us into elastic belts and fetal monitors and anti-gravity beds. But I do think that even the meekest woman would balk if she walked into  a delivery room that looked like Frankenstein’s laboratory.

Maybe they could hire hunchbacked delivery room nurses and use those cool Halloween soundtrack CDs,  just to round out the whole experience.

Or maybe a calliope. And nurses dressed in Mad Hatter costumes (you know, the teacup rides???).

A few years later, Dr. Blonsky was issued a separate patent for that lovely mesh baby catcher. He billed it as a “safety net,” I guess just in case the OB sorta, you know, let it slip.

Luckily, patent rights provide that Dr. Blonsky has full control over his, um, invention. It does not protect him from ridicule.

They did know that there was no such force as “centrifugal,” even in 1963, didn’t they?

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