How long do epidurals take to work

You should realistically expect half an hour or more from the time you request an epidural to feeling pain relief. Consider the time required for the anaesthetist to arrive from within the hospital (10minutes) or from outside of the hospital (20 minutes); time to discuss your medical history and the epidural with you and answer questions (10 minutes); time to scrub and perform the epidural if straightforward (10 minutes); and time for the local anaesthetic to begin to work effectively (10 minutes). The epidural may take longer to insert if you are very short or obese, you are carrying twins, you have had several epidurals previously, the time between your contractions is very short, the bony spines are prominent, a blood vessel is hit. Whilst labour pain is no humbug, it is important that an epidural is not rushed.