Unfortunately many internals are done either because the hospital policy says that they should be done, the doctor wants one done or the midwife wants to see what is going on. Personally I don’t do internals unless the woman asks me to check or prior to giving morphine/pethidine. I prefer to watch a woman in labour, if you watch closely then you can usually tell within reason how well that woman is progressing and give a reasonably accurate estimation of how far she is dilated.