Methods	Randomised trial.
Participants	100 women. Inclusion criteria - women who had been admitted to the labour room and had term pregnancies; were in the latent phase of labour or the active phase with the cervix between 1 and 3 cm; no medical stimulation of labour was required; no evidence of cephalopelvic disproportion; no history of surgery or trauma to the cervix; normal prenatal course; cephalic presentation
Interventions	Intervention group: sitting (n = 50). All women were allowed to sit up after the amniotomy had been performed and the presenting part was engaged. The women were allowed to lie down from time to time, if they desired. Comparison group: supine (n = 50). All women were placed in the supine position and allowed to turn on their sides. Direct fetal and maternal monitoring was performed randomly on several women in both groups, using a choriometric unit
Outcomes	Length first stage labour. Apgar.
Notes
Risk of bias
Item	Authors’ judgement	Description
Adequate sequence generation?	Unclear	Described as ‘divided randomly into two groups’.
Allocation concealment?	Unclear	Not stated.
Blinding? Women	No	Not feasible.
Blinding? Clinical staff	No	Not feasible.
Blinding? Outcome assessor	Unclear	Not stated.
Incomplete outcome data addressed? All outcomes	Yes	No losses to follow up.