Trends in mode of delivery of breech presentation over a 5-year period

Journal of Perinatology (2007) 27, 464–465 r 2007 Nature Publishing Group All rights reserved. 0743-8346/07 $30 www.nature.com/jp

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Trends in mode of delivery of breech presentation over a 5-year period Journal of Perinatology (2007) 27, 464; doi:10.1038/sj.jp.7211761

I read with great interest the article by Lee et al.1 reporting the differences in mode of singleton breech delivery by races in 1999 and 2000. However, their data may be too old to examine the recent tendency of the mode of delivery in singleton breech presentation. In Japan, for example, there has been a significant increase in the primary elective cesarean delivery rate of singleton breech pregnancies over the past 5 years.2 This phenomenon is associated with the ACOG recommendation in 2001,3 which recommended cesarean delivery for the term singleton breech. I retrospectively reviewed the clinical records of Japanese pregnant women at Japanese Red Cross Katsushika Maternity Hospital between 2000 and 2005. There were 61 cases of singleton breech term deliveries in 2000 and 69 cases in 2005. The primary elective cesarean delivery rate based on informed consent increased from 59.0% (36 cases) in 2000 to 76.8% (53 cases) in 2005 (P