Largest study of its kind of women in labor finds nitrous oxide safe, side effects rare

(University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus) Researchers at the University of Colorado College of Nursing and the School of Medicine Department of Anesthesiology at the Anschutz Medical Campus found that the use of nitrous oxide (N2O) as a pain relief option for individuals in labor is safe for newborn children and laboring individual, and converting to a different form of pain relief such as an epidural or opioid is influenced by a woman's prior birth history and other factors.