Four
Contrasting Studies on Safety: (1) unattended, (2) lay midwife-attended,
(3) professional
midwife-attended and (4) obstetrician-attended
-- providing cost-effective maternity care to
an essentially healthy population via
“maximal results with minimal interventions”
a beneficial
ratio of interventions to outcomes for each childbearing woman
Making Normal
Birth a Reality - a Consensus Statement from the Maternity Care Working Party
and endorsed by the UK’s Royal College of Obstetricians andGynaecologists (RCOG),
the Royal College of Midwives, the National Childbirth Trust, and other
organizations.
EXCERPT:
Ob-gyn and midwife organizations in the UK are endorsing a new consensus
report calling for action to increase rates of ‘normal birth’ where appropriate
in order to minimize morbidity and complication rates. "Choice of
place of birth including home birth, a midwife-led birth centre
and a maternity unit with midwifery and medical facilities.
The definition of normal birth is: “without
induction, without the use of instruments, not by caesarean section and without
general, spinal or epidural anaesthetic before or during delivery” (see p3 of
document for details ."Procedures
used during labour which are known to increase the likelihood of medical
interventions should be avoided where possible. For example, continuous
electronic fetal monitoring during labour in low-risk women is associated with
an increase in emergency caesarean section but no long-term health gain, (5) and
use of epidural anaesthetic in labour increases the need for forceps or
ventouse. (6) ...... it is important that women’s needs and wishes are respected
and they should be able to make informed decisions about their care."
Best Evidence - Extensive archive of
links to primary sources, citation lists and excerpts documenting the scientific
basis for physiological
childbirth as the universal standard of care for healthy women with normal
pregnancies.
Other topics included on the "Best Evidence"
subdirectory are (1) community-based midwifery, and (2) political and
historical forces that have inappropriately medicalized normal childbirth in the
US and which underlie the push by organized medicine to declare elective
Cesarean surgery the new, 21st century standard of care for in a healthy
population. This archival subdirectory contains all the important article
sprinkled through out the College of Midwives web site, including several on
that can be accessed directly via links above and below on this home page
Marginalizing of Nurse Midwifery
In a hurry? Want to cut to the chase or copy text for a quote?
Click on the
Annotated
Excerpts
Additional articles relevant to marginalizing
or eliminating nurse midwifery care:
Choice
in Planning and Experiencing Childbirth
AMA Journal of Ethics ~ Virtual Mentor.
September 2004, Volume 6, Number 9. Policy Forum
Birth Environments 1992
Economics of hospital obstetrical departments
&
Med-Mal Insurance as a money maker
2007
Maternal Mortality
Rises Previous 3 years -- maternal deaths more frequent
after C-section
than normal birth ~ Compilation of reports and MM Stats from California, New
York and the UK
ACEO
Policy Statement on OOH Birth
Report on BMJ study
on PHB published in ObGynNews 2005
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