Butwick AJ, et al. - Researchers used U.S. natality data on 17,220,680 deliveries, to examine the associations between body mass index class and neuraxial labor analgesia, adjusting for sociodemographic, antenatal, pregnancy, and peripartum factors, presuming that obese women have a higher rate of neuraxial analgesia vs nonobese parturients. They found that, of 17 million women delivering at a U.S. hospital between 2009 and 2015, neuraxial analgesia was received by 68% of women with a normal body mass index, while 76% of women with a body mass index more than 40 kg/m² received neuraxial analgesia. Neuraxial analgesia was received by only 60% of underweight parturients. Overall, they concluded that, for morbidly obese women vs women with normal body mass index, the likelihood of receiving neuraxial analgesia was only marginally increased.