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scarlettkatrin's comments:
on Midwifery Controversy
Go you!
I can understand both Heather's point and yours. I hope that she didn't mean that teen mom's should be treated with disrespect, but they often are. She felt that she was not being treated as the intelligent human that she was. Everyone deserves that regardless of their age!
posted 2 years, 10 months ago
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on Midwifery Controversy
I think the issue was that the birth didn't go wrong (in the sense that the mother got poor care) it went wrong in the sense that births are unpredictable and can take a turn for the worse. She got perfect care from her midwife, who carefully monitored her and her baby and transferred her to a hospital in a timely manner when it was evident that hospital care was needed.
posted 2 years, 10 months ago
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on Midwifery Controversy
It's funny, I do believe that homebirth and birth center midwifery has direct medical advantages over hospital birth in the low-risk, healthy pregnancy. We usually assume that hospital birth is risk free, but there are situations in which mothers or babies have actually perished as a direct result of commonly used hospital interventions that would never be used in a home birth.
Cytotec/misoprostol is a great example. It is a drug approved by the FDA to treat people with ulcers. For ulcer patients it is taken orally. Misoprostol, however, contains synthetic prostaglandins which can ripen the cervix and induce labor. OBs figured out that if you placed this very inexpensive pill onto a woman's cervix you could soften it enough to induce with Pitocin or could start labor using misoprostol alone. This works beautifully in many cases, but for some women (or perhaps it has to do with how close she is to labor anyway) the use of this drug caused hyperstimulation of the uterus with catastrophic effects for the mother or baby. The uterus would contract uncontrollably causing a rupture of the uterus, lack of oxygen to the baby and after the birth of the baby the uterus can be so fatigued that it fails to clamp down on the blood vessels after the placenta is born causing massive hemorrhaging causing the death of the mother or necessitating a blood transfusion. This cause of maternal or newborn death is entirely preventable, and is a risk of giving birth in the hospital.
I have known women who were given misoprostol to start labor who were not informed of the risks. They were lucky to be in the majority of women who react positively to the drug, but they were not given a choice whether they wanted to take on those risk (for instance to avoid another set of risks, such as risks of continuing the pregnancy with preeclampsia or risks of cesarean delivery.)
Everyone asks the question: Is home birth safe? No one is asking the question: Is hospital birth safe?
posted 2 years, 10 months ago
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on Midwifery Controversy
Jacob, your post illustrates exactly the views of most of America, that birth is extremely dangerous (it's not) and also that homebirth and birth center midwives don't have the "experience and knowledge" necessary to safeguard a birth.
We assume that hospitals are necessarily safer for birth than home. But "adverse events" happen in hospitals quite frequently. They just aren't reported in the media. I know it sounds crazy because we just never hear about it, but it's true. It's hospitals that use Cytotec/misoprostol "off-label" to induce labor, causing hyperstimulation of the uterus in some women with tragic effects for the mother or the baby (oxygen deprivation or death for the baby, uterine rupture, or massive hemorrhaging for the mother). It is hospitals that overuse the life-saving cesarean surgery. When the surgery is not necessary, it can do more harm than good, contributing to maternal death by post-surgery infection, fatal blood clots or placenta accreta in a later pregnancy.
Far from a dangerous undertaking, birth at home is very safe. At least 90% of planned homebirths are successfully completed at home. Most things that can go wrong in a birth go wrong slowly, with plenty of time for an experienced midwife to use her professional judgement to transfer to a hospital with tools and surgical capabilities when necessary. A transport to the hospital from home is not a demonstration that homebirth is not safe, it's proof that midwives know when to transfer care to a specialist.
I have had two homebirths. My first went beautifully, except that I bled excessively after the placenta was born. My experienced midwife was able to stop the bleeding and stabilize me without any outside intervention, though she wouldn't have hesitated to call an ambulance if my bleeding hadn't slowed. I chose the same midwife for my second birth, which also went beautifully, except that my son was a bit slow to breathe. Still, not a problem for my well equipped midwives! They know how to stimulate a just-born baby and carry oxygen, which we used to help my son breathe and "pink up."
As I said in my previous post. Birth has some risks, whether in the hospital or at home. No one can guarantee you a perfect birth or a healthy baby. Since there are no absolutes about what care is best, it really ought to be up to the parents to make informed decisions.
posted 2 years, 10 months ago
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