Home birth latest discussion

[Saila]

A third of US citizens do not have proper health insurance. The rich/poor divide over there is shockingly bad.

Completely agree with above post in that every mother (and father) should have their baby in the way they want to but for some that may be a c-section and for others a home birth. So we should leave other parents alone to make their own choice.

[Saffron]

new mother Wrote:

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> Well, DG, readers of this thread can draw their

> own conclusions.

>

> All I can report is personal experience and what I

> have observed with friends. For us, and perhaps

> many others who I have never met, the downside

> risks of major problems for the baby, in

> pregnancies that looked textbook all along

> (critical point!), are more concerning than any

> marginal benefits that may or may not exist from a

> pv delivery.

The benefits of vaginal birth to the baby are neither non-existent nor marginal, as your opinion suggests. This is not my opinion which I'm trying to pass as fact. This is actual research which is out there in peer-reviewed journals.

Although an elective C-section birth may not be detrimental to the baby in an immediate sense, neither is it beneficial in the immediate or the long-run.

(Medically necessary C-secs are another story altogether of course, and a true medical wonder for the babies' lives they save.)

[mooncake]

Yak Wrote:

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> Back to the OP, what interests me most is the

> different stats for home births for first and

> second time mothers. Why is there such a

> difference? Is it because the mother is more aware

> of what is going on a second time round, and

> therefore more able to escalate concerns? That's

> one area I'd really like to see more research in.

It seems to me that the categorisation of 'low risk' mothers is much narrower once you get to second & third time mums. There are many potential things that can go wrong once you get to the childbirth that can't be predicted from an otherwise normal, healthy pregnancy - but once these things have happened with the first child, it may then indicate it's inappropriate for you to have a home birth the second time around.

The second thing of course, is that labour is quicker and more straightforward with subsequent children anyway.

For me, one of the most striking things from the report was the stat that as many as 1 in 200 births to LOW RISK first time mothers have a poor outcome, even in a hospital environment. In what other context would the probability of these sorts of outcomes ever be considered a low risk??

[Saffron]

For categorisation of risk in multiparous women, I think attrition must also play a role. If a mother had a very poor outcome from her first labour and delivery, then it's possible that she will choose not to have more childen, or that if she does, she will choose a planned C-section (which was not included in this study for obvious reasons).