Ladies, the physicians of America have issued their decree: they don't want you having your babies at home with midwives.
We can't imagine why not. Study upon study have shown that planning a home birth with a trained midwife is a great choice if you want to avoid unnecessary medical intervention. Midwives are experts in supporting the physiological birth process: monitoring you and your baby during labor, helping you into positions that help labor progress, protecting your pelvic parts from damage while you push, and "catching" the baby from the position that's most effective and comfortable for you -- hands and knees, squatting, even standing -- not the position most comfortable for her.
When healthy women are supported this way, 95% give birth vaginally, with hardly any intervention.
And yet, the American Medical Association doesn't see the point. Yesterday at its annual meeting it adopted a policy written by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists against "home deliveries" and in support of legislation "that helps ensure safe deliveries and healthy babies by acknowledging that the safest setting for labor, delivery, and the immediate post-partum period is in the hospital" or accredited birth center.
"There ought to be a law!" cry the doctors.
The trouble is, they have no evidence to back up their safety claims. In fact, the largest and most rigorous study of home birth internationally to date found that among 5,000 healthy, "low-risk" women, babies were born just as safely at home under a midwife's care as in the hospital. And not only that, the study, like many before it, found that the women actually fared better at home, with far fewer interventions like labor induction, cesarean section, and episiotomy (taking scissors to the vagina, a practice that according to the research should be obsolete but is still performed on one-third of women who give birth vaginally).
Which is why the American Public Health Association and the American College of Nurse Midwives support women choosing home birth. The British OB/GYNs have read the research, too, and have this to say: "There is no reason why home birth should not be offered to women at low risk of complications... it may confer considerable benefits for them and their families. There is ample evidence showing that labouring at home increases a woman's likelihood of a birth that is both satisfying and safe..."
The other trouble with the American MDs is that they seem to have lost all respect for women's civil rights, indeed for the U.S. Constitution -- the right to privacy, to bodily integrity, and the right of every adult to determine her own health care. The "father knows best" legislation they are promoting could indeed be used to criminally prosecute women who choose home birth, say, by equating it with child abuse.
Research evidence be damned, the doctors want to mandate you to go to the hospital. They don't want you to have a choice.
We think they're spooked. The cesarean rate is rising, celebrities are publicizing their home births (the initial wording of the AMA resolution actually took aim at Ricki for publicizing her home birth on the Today Show!), people are reading Pushed and watching The Business of Being Born, and there's a nationwide legislative "push" to license certified professional midwives in all states (The AMA is against that, too, by the way).
The docs are on the defensive.
After all, birth is big business -- it's in fact the most common reason for a woman to be admitted to the hospital. And if more women start giving birth outside of it, who will get paid? Not doctors and not hospitals.
"The AMA supports a woman's right to make an informed decision regarding her delivery and to choose her health care provider," the group said in a statement. But if it really supported women's choices it wouldn't adopt a policy condemning home birth and midwives.
Because if U.S. women are to have real birth choices, everybody needs to be working together to provide them, not waging turf wars at their expense.
Melanie Batley: Time to Reconsider Whether the NHS Should be Encouraging Home Births
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First, compare the amount of money that Doctors and Hospitals have over billed and milked from the insurance companies, as compared to midwives doing home births.
Secondly, compare the amounts of unneeded as well as questionab
Its all a dollar game with you people, and has nothing at all to respecting patients rights, or providing them with the care and passion they deserve.
You are so down on MANA, that one would almost think your misdirecte
Food for thought Amy. If you check your lineage and family tree, I'm sure you'll find many babies were delivered by midwives, without which you might not be here now. Think about it.
Kenneth C Johnson, senior epidemiolo
- Medical interventi
You can view the full article and references on the British Medical Journal website at the following link: http://www
If you are someone who needs to see statistics
The bottom line on this matter is that EVERY WOMAN HAS THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE WHERE SHE GIVES BIRTH.
See the interventi
See the authors' descriptio
Consider also that the study was done in collaborat
Bottom line: a study performed by the homebirth industry and funded by the homebirth industry was forced to resort to deception to suppress the fact that the study ACTUALLY showed that homebirth has an increased rate of neonatal death.
Everyone should read the study for themselves
And feel free to honestly compare the stats from any year, any hospital in the US to the CPM record. It still proves that low-risk homebirth with a trained midwife is just as safe as low-risk birth in a US hospital. Twist and spin all you want, the facts stand.
http://wom
The people commenting above that homebirth is not safe for low-risk pregnancie
http://www
The Midwives' Alliance of North America holds the position that home birth is a safe option for many women.
Statistics have demonstrat
In keeping with its position, MANA:
* supports the right of women to choose home birth and of midwives to work in the home birth setting;
* encourages access and referral to physicians and hospital care when transfer from home to hospital becomes necessary; and
* encourages organizati
The Midwives Alliance of North America is the largest organizati
MANA has been collecting detailed safety statistics on all homebirths with a CNM since 2001. They have PUBLICLY offered these statistics to those who can demonstrat
Researcher
"a. A statement that the decision has been made by the group
b. A list of participat
4) The DOR will then send a contract which contains two parts:
a. The agreement between the associatio
b. A Non-disclo
The data made available from the Midwives Alliance Statistics Project ... puts the control of the data in the hands of the midwives."
In contrast, national safety data for is posted on the CDC website and anyone can view it.
MANA has taken extraordin
Homebirth with a DEM is unsafe. MANA's own data shows it. In response, MANA has taken extraordin
You claim that these stats show something terrible, but you haven't seen them. You have a crystal ball?
The reality is, you know very well that the stats will show the same thing they have always shown - that low-risk homebirth with a trained midwife is just as safe as low-risk birth in a hospital in the US.
You and ACOG are still in contortion
The sad thing is, the intelligen
Unethical types can always twist things to imply a lie, only you don't even imply lies, you just declare them outright. MANA could sue you for your comments.
DEMs have successful
1. Homebirth is KNOWN to increase the neonatal death rate
2. American DEMs are grossly undereduca
The government has begun collecting statistics on homebirth with a DEM. The first large data set already shows that homebirth with a DEM triples the rate of neonatal death compared to low risk hospital birth. This is consistent with all the existing scientific evidence. Homebirth advocates will no longer be able to pretend to themselves or others that homebirth is safe.
MANA, the trade union for DEMs, has confused people about the education and training of DEMs. Their certificat
Homebirth advocates are shrilly and falsely decrying the AMA's attempt to "outlaw" homebirth when the AMA is simply asking for acknowledg
Hiring a surgeon to catch your baby is like hiring a pediatrici
Amy, you might benefit by studying how systems like England, the Netherland
Studies in Evidence Based Medicine have revealed Obstetrics has one of the lowest percentage rates of concrete facts to substantia
Credible contrary opinions from MDs, PhDs and midwives indicate other opinions are available. Famed American midwife Ina May Gaskin has an internatio
We need a medical establishm
Most importantl
Time to look deeper. Sorry AMA and ACOG. You are out of step with the future. I’ve seen the green movement transform from sentimenta
WHEREAS, The National Organizati
priority issue; and
WHEREAS, NOW believes that women should have compete authority over their reproducti
WHEREAS, reproducti
WHEREAS, women have historical
WHEREAS, the practice of midwifery has many benefits including lower costs, lower rates of premature births, higher rates of breastfeed
WHEREAS, midwifery has a lower incidence of medical interventi
WHEREAS, women's access to midwifery and traditiona
THEREFORE, BE IT RESLOVED that The National Organizati
BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED that NOW work in cooperatio
Obstetrici
Certified Profession
I've had 3 cesareans (2 emergency, 1 planned/co
Support our right to CHOOSE where and how we give birth!