US/Canada/Australia birth terms

[UtahDoula]

What terminology related to birth have you noticed is different from one English-speaking country to another? For example:

labour/labor
Mom/mum
Pitocin/syntocin
prenatal/antenatal

etc.

[brilliant]

not neccesarily related to birth but acetaminophen is paracetamol in the uk and oz.

i've lived in all 4 countries so my poor brain has been through the wringer!!

[Tiffany]

I'm completely messed up because I'm American, and then I'm here in Canada and they use a lot of UK english. It's weird because I see both antenatal and prenatal used here, so I find when I am describing my services I use them both interchangably.. I suppose I should just pick one, I mean they both mean the same thing.

It took me a long time to get used to typing "labour" instead of "labor", but now it's habit.

The one thing I don't get is the usage of oxytocin, pitocin and Syntocinon. Oxytocin is what your body makes, and pitocin is a synthetic form? So is Syntocinon also the synthetic form or is it also used to refer to oxytocin?

I mentioned pitocin once in a hospital as what they would use to augment labour, and a nurse corrected me and said oxytocin. So, I suppose I've been thoroughly confused about this for a long time now. Help me out!

Edit: Ok, well I just found this, however it doesn't help me determine where and when I should be saying oxytocin or pitocin in terms of inducing and augmenting labour.

"Synthetic oxytocin is sold as medication under the trade names Pitocin and Syntocinon and also as generic Oxytocin. Oxytocin is destroyed in the gastrointestinal tract, and therefore must be administered by injection or as nasal spray. Oxytocin has a half-life of typically about three minutes in the blood. Oxytocin given intravenously does not enter the brain in significant quantities - it is excluded from the brain by the blood-brain barrier. Drugs administered by nasal spray are thought to have better access to the CNS. An oxytocin nasal spray has been used to stimulate breastfeeding."

[UtahDoula]

Oxytocin = what your brain makes OR the generic version of the drug. Some people like to ONLY use the generic term to emphasize how it is "identical" to the kind your brain makes. But that's debateable, isn't it? It may have the same chemical structure, but administerng it IV keeps it out of the brain and you lose the endorphins there.
Pitocin and Syntocinon are brand names for the drug. My understanding is that it is marketed as Pitocin in the US and Syntocinon in Canada & the UK. But I'm not sure - that's part of why I'm asking.

[syncreo]

Hmmm...interesting. I think you are right it is called syntocinon here in Canada but I call it pitocin and the nurses call it oxytocin. I like to be clear that it IS different from our body's oxytocin so I call it pitocin (which comes from reading American birth books I also use prenatal because I don't like antenatal (I don't know why, just one of my many quirks )

I write labour and call moms - moms

[brilliant]

hmmm interesting... my midwives always called it "pitocin". odd if it's not sold here under that name. ???

[RosyDoula]

Don't forget hemorrhage and haemorrhage, fetal and foetal, cesarean and caesarian.

Hehe, I tease Harry "labour" is lay-booor.