Maternity Ward Monitoring Devices

To the Editor.— The article by Schifrin and Dame, "Fetal Heart Rate Patterns—Prediction of Apgar Score" in the March 6th issue deserves praise for their fine attempt to point up the clinical applicability of a rather sophisticated piece of medical equipment. All too often, physicians and hospital are caught up with the glamor of accumulating expensive monitoring devices without fully appreciating what these devices are measuring, whether or not useful data can be obtained from this equipment and whether or not the physician or nurse can appropriately alter the care of their patient in response to this information in order to achieve a better result. I think we must consider our maternity wards more and more in the light of an appropriate intensive care area in order to help in the achievement of the highest quality of life. In my humble opinion, the hallmark of an intensive care area, taking