Factors That Affect The Rate Of The Pregnancy - 1313 Words

OT plays a major role in the initiation of labor particularly during the expulsive phase by stimulating prostaglandin release in species, specifically in the uterine epithelium. Blanks and Thornton (2003) study revealed that secretion of oxytocin is at its maximum level during fetal delivery of pups but the amount of OT released during expulsion of the pups varies among species. According to them, oxytocin is at its peak at the time of delivery of the first fetus in rabbit, and throughout labor with greater pulses overlapping with pup’s expulsion in rats. Variations in oxytocin level are also seen during the pregnancy and labor in humans. According to Blanks and Thornton (2003) several discrepancies are present when in OT is measured in†¦show more content†¦This suggests that OT is critical for the ejection of milk but not parturition. Additionally, after injecting OT on OT null mice and wild type mice, the start of premature labor within 24hrs was observed at high co ncentrations of OT in both wild and null mice (Blanks Thornton, 2003). With that in mind, abnormal modification of OT action does influence the start of labor. In conclusion, they put forward the idea that OT receptor in mice is mostly invested in the timing for the initiation of labor. Most importantly, the OT receptor is essential for normal labor because those receptors are found in abundance in uterine epithelium during late pregnancy promoting contractile effects. Along with those findings, female rats that are undergone a knockout of OT, showed a decreased in maternal care of their pups but displayed a higher level of aggression (Bales Perkeybile, 2012). Social rearing conditions plays a role in the binding of OT. Prairie voles, when differently handled by experimenters a week after being born resulted in more OTR binding (Bales et al 2011). When changing the animal’s cages, experimenters carried the parent prairies vole by the scruff of the neck and others were not touched. Those females that had careful attention and handling by the experimenters displayed an increase in OTR binding. The same results were reported in males. They concluded that the type of maintenance that pups received in early days after being born does affect