title: [Influences of lunar cycle in labor: myth or scientific finding?].
abstract: Superstitions are found everywhere in our lives, and medicine, a profession that is prides itself on an evidence-based approach to treatment, is not exempt. A superstition that pervades the labor and delivery floor is that it is busier during certain phases of the lunar cycle, specifically the full moon. Although some studies have demonstrated an increase in deliveries that are related to the lunar cycle, there has been disagreement about when, in the lunar cycle, the peak volume occurs. Front to the divergence of the existent results in the literature to relate the events of the lunar cycle with deliveries, the aim of this review was to accomplish the literature in the attempt of explaining this popular culture with base in the results presented by different researchers.
authors.affiliation: Departamento de Ginecologia e Obstetrícia, Faculdade de Medicina de Botucatu, Universidade Estadual de São Paulo, Botucatu, SP.
authors.forename: Aline
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bueno
authors.forename: Isabela Lovizutto
authors.initials: IL
authors.lastname: Iessi
authors.forename: Débora Cristina
authors.initials: DC
authors.lastname: Damasceno
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007743:Labor, Obstetric / Q000502:physiology*; D016081:Moon; D011247:Pregnancy; D013483:Superstitions