Edinburgh charity the Birth Resource Centre told Dunedin Napier News it believes NHS plans to encourage home birth in the Lothians are a good idea.

As birth rates rise the new Maternity Services Strategy is an attempt to double the number of home births annually, partly to ease the pressure on hospitals.

Jo Harknett, Coordinator at the Birth Rescource Centre, said: “We absolutely believe that informing, encouraging and supporting women and their partners to explore options for where they birth their babies is a good thing. If this is done positively and proactively then it is very likely that more women will choose to birth at home.”

http://dunedinnapiernews.com/2008/12/11/home-births-to-be-encouraged/

THE number of mums giving birth at home is lower in North Wales than in the rest of Wales, figures released last night show.

But those choosing home delivery rather than opting for a hospital maternity ward has increased sharply.

http://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/2008/12/10/home-birth-figures-low-in-north-wales-55578-22443100/

Campaigners will issue a stern warning tomorrow that childbirth has become a political football, with the Government pandering to the natural birth lobby and so denying women the freedom to have elective Caesareans and pain relief.

At a meeting with Kevin Barron MP, chair of the Commons Health Select Committee, the Birth Trauma Association (BTA) and other support groups will call for urgent action to ensure women are given a real choice of treatment. The campaigners accuse the Government of having allowed childbirth to be dominated by policies which suit some groups of women to the detriment of others, and are calling on ministers to create an inclusive maternity policy.

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-wellbeing/health-news/natural-childbirth-movement-denies-women-choice-1031227.html

A quantitative study based on 50,000 first births between 2000 and 2005 showed that induced labours were more likely than spontaneous births to lead to forceps delivery, caesarean section and haemorrhage.

Babies were also more likely to be admitted to nursery care and to require active resuscitation after induced labour.

Mary-Ann Davey of Mother and Child Health Research at La Trobe University, who conducted the study, stressed that the sample included only those women whose pregnancies were progressing in a healthy and normal manner.

http://www.newkerala.com/topstory-fullnews-58375.html#

Problems With the First Recommendation in Level C: “Because uterine rupture may be catastrophic, VBAC [vaginal birth after cesarean] should be attempted in institutions equipped to respond to emergencies with physicians immediately available to provide emergency care.”

The first problem with this recommendation is that of the eight final recommendations, it is this one which has the largest impact on maternity care in the United States. Yet by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists’ (ACOG) own admission, there is no evidence to back up this recommendation. This is of course the reason this recommendation has been placed in Level C, thus making it ACOG’s confession that since there are no data, ACOG will simply have to go on the basis of “expert opinion.” This is a sad regression to the days of “Trust me, I’m a doctor”—in spite of the new direction of medical care to evidence-based practice.

http://www.midwiferytoday.com/articles/acog.asp

Our mission is to improve maternity care by providing the public, especially childbearing women and their families, with the information necessary to make fully informed decisions relating to how, where, and with whom they will give birth.

http://www.choicesinchildbirth.org/

New York City’s cesarean section rate has increased by 24% over the past six years to an average of nearly 31%, and rates are on the rise at nearly every single city hospital, according to new data released by Choices in Childbirth, a New York-based nonprofit that works to enable women to make fully informed maternity decisions. Most city hospitals are not addressing the potential causes of the increase in c-section rates.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/118284.php

Recent studies reaffirm earlier World Health Organization recommendations about optimal cesarean section rates. The best outcomes for mothers and babies appear to occur with cesarean section rates of 5% to 10%. Rates above 15% seem to do more harm than good (Althabe and Belizan 2006).

The national U.S. cesarean section rate was 4.5% and near this optimal range in 1965 when it was first measured (Taffel et al. 1987). In more recent years, large groups of healthy, low-risk American women who have received care that enhanced their bodies’ innate capacity for giving birth have achieved 4% cesarean section rates and good overall birth outcomes (Johnson and Daviss 2005, Rooks et al. 1989). However, the national cesarean section rate is much higher and has been increasing steadily over the past decade. When a national rate is available for 2007, we will find that about one mother in three is now giving birth by c-section, a record level for the United States.

http://www.childbirthconnection.org/article.asp?ck=10456

Promoting healthy pregnancy and safe childbirth is a goal of all European health care systems. Despite progress in recent decades, mothers and their babies are still very much at risk during the perinatal period, which covers pregnancy, delivery, and the postpartum.

The European Perinatal Health Report released by the EURO-PERISTAT project is the most comprehensive report on the subject to date and takes a new approach to health reporting. Instead of comparing countries on single indicators like infant mortality (the ‘report card’ or ‘league table’ approach), the report paints a fuller picture by presenting data about mortality, low birthweight and preterm birth alongside data about health care and other factors that can affect the outcome of pregnancy. It also illustrates differences in the ways that data are collected, and explains how these can affect comparisons between countries.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081211112010.htm

EDIT: The report mentioned in this post can be downloaded for free at http://www.europeristat.com.

Postpartum depression (PPD) can lead to poor sleep quality, recent research shows. A new study shows that depression symptoms worsen in PPD patients when their quality of sleep declines.

Sleep deprivation can hamper a mother’s ability to care for her infant, as judgment and concentration decline. Sleep-deprived mothers also may inadvertently compromise their infants’ sleep quality because infants often adopt their mothers’ circadian sleep rhythms.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081210122236.htm

A Newcastle University study involving thousands of families is helping prospective parents work out whether they are likely to have sons or daughters. The work by Corry Gellatly, a research scientist at the university, has shown that men inherit a tendency to have more sons or more daughters from their parents. This means that a man with many brothers is more likely to have sons, while a man with many sisters is more likely to have daughters.

The research involved a study of 927 family trees containing information on 556,387 people from North America and Europe going back to 1600.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081211121835.htm

A large proteomics study on the brains of newborn mice provides more evidence that numbing drugs often used in obstetric or pediatric medicine can have profound and long-term negative effects, even after minimal exposure.

This study highlights the delicate state of the developing nervous system and reinforces the use of caution when administering sedatives, anesthetics, and anti-convulsants to pregnant women or infants.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081211141936.htm

Free Mother-Friendly Documents and Downloads
The following documents are available for free downloads as PDF files from the Coalition For Improving Maternity Services. Permission is granted to freely reproduce in whole or in part along with complete attribution as indicated on the PDF itself.

http://www.motherfriendly.org/downloads.php

The purpose of this website is to offer information, support and assistance to those dealing with postpartum mood disorders, their families, friends, physicians and counselors. We strive to help those who have not been personally touched by postpartum mental illness understand that it is not something that one can “get over” or “wish away,” or something that can necessarily be overcome with “more prayer” or “a better outlook.”

http://www.ppdsupportpage.com

PSI is built on the foundation of providing support to families. If you or someone you know might be experiencing symptoms of prenatal or postpartum mood or anxiety disorder, know that it is treatable and you’ve taken a very important first step. We have PSI Coordinators throughout the world who provide information and support. There is someone in your area who can help you if you are experiencing any of the following: depressed, irritable, exhausted, unlike yourself, sadness, anger, guilt, worry, feelings of inadequacy.

http://postpartum.net/

Late preterm birth puts newborns at increased risk for serious problems, according to U.S. researchers.

Dr. Joann Petrini of the March of Dimes and colleagues studied the neurological development of more than 140,00 preterm to full-term babies born between 2000 and 2004. And they found that late preterm babies (those born between 34 weeks and 36 weeks) were more than three times as likely as full-term babies to be diagnosed with cerebral palsy and were also at increased risk for developmental delay or mental retardation.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/11/AR2008121101430.html

Babies born via cesarean section are more likely to be asthmatic in comparison to babies delivered naturally, according to an article released on December 2, 2008 in Thorax, one of the BMJ Specialist journals.

In the past decades, asthma rates have increased dramatically, paralleling an increase in cesarean section births. The proportion of these procedures has increased from 5% in the 1970s to more than 30% in 2000. However, studies examining the potential link between asthma and cesarean delivery have been inconclusive.

About 3,000 children were followed until the age of 8 years with regard to respiratory health, and this data was compared to the methods of birth. At age 8, 12.4% (362) had been diagnosed with asthma and thus prescribed inhaled steroids. While only 8.5% (247) of the children were born by cesarean, but these children were nearly 80% more likely to have a diagnosis of asthma, in comparison to the children delivered naturally.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/131547.php

Ohio Families for Safe Birth (OFSB) is a consumer-driven effort to create a statewide coalition of families and professionals promoting legislation and policies grounded in the Midwives Model of Care which support families’ access to safe, appropriate, evidence-based care during pregnancy, labor, delivery and postpartum. Our purposes are:

* Supporting legislation that licenses Certified Professional Midwives (CPMs) in Ohio;
* Raising awareness and support for families choosing an out-of-hospital birth as a safe, appropriate option;
* Supporting safe family and baby initiatives in all birth settings.

http://www.safebirthohio.org/

In Haiti, 76% of all deliveries are done by non-qualified persons, contributing to the highest infant and maternal mortality in the western hemisphere. 15% of newborns have low birth weight and 25% of the children suffer from chronic malnutrition. The World Health Organization has estimated that the things professional midwives know how to do – preventative prenatal care, handling complications of pregnancy and birth, and teaching nutrition –could totally change these statistics.

Midwives for Haiti was started by certified nurse-midwives who believe every woman in this world deserves the knowledge and care to have a safe pregnancy and birth. We also believe that even women who cannot read or write are teachable. With the right knowledge and tools, community women can make birth safer and keep babies and mothers from dying. We want to bridge the gap between the traditional birth attendants and the nurse-midwives trained in the medical model so that more women in Haiti have access to skilled care.

http://www.midwivesforhaiti.org/