DONA International is proud to present a Today Show segment on labor and postpartum doulas. Please take 5 minutes to view this segment and pass on to any and all of your friends.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26887140/#30894159

If the link does not work, go to the Today Show website and look for the segment on “Mothering the Mother”.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1047180/the_lie_of_the_edd_why_your_due_date.html?cat=25

We have it ingrained in our heads throughout our entire adult lives-pregnancy is 40 weeks. The “due date” we are given at that first prenatal visit is based upon that 40 weeks, and we look forward to it with great anticipation. When we are still pregnant after that magical date, we call
ourselves “overdue” and the days seem to drag on like years. The problem with this belief about the 40 week EDD is that it is not based in fact. It is one of many pregnancy and childbirth myths which has wormed its way into the standard of practice over the years-something that is still believed because “that’s the way it’s always been done”.

http://www.unnecesarean.com/blog/2009/6/12/your-friendly-1936-neighborhood-ob-says-dont-kiss-your-baby.html

Sometimes it feels like previous generations have no idea what the women of childbearing age are doing with all of this crazy baby-holding and baby-walking-around-with and cuddling that seems like coddling. Surely the child just screamed in the store because he his spoiled from all of this attention! The young women with their conscious births and “bonding” and wearing of the babies— they’re mad!

Today would be as good a day as any to let their criticism and fears about parenting, out-of-hospital birth and breastfeeding roll right off like water off a duck’s back. This guy might have been their obstetrician, and they might have placed great weight on his advice. He was a doctor, after all.

http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/article/20090614/NEWS/906140351/1006

Seventy percent of women who died from pregnancy-related causes in New York state underwent cesarean-section births, more than twice the rate at which cesareans are performed in the state.

The findings come from a report on maternal mortality obtained under the Freedom of Information Law from the state Health Department, which sponsored the study. The research was performed by the New York chapter of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

The study, which was not dated, analyzed case files of 33 of the 141 women who died as a result of pregnancy and childbirth from 2003 to 2005. There were two deaths among Ulster County women in that time, and none in Dutchess, but it is not known if they were part of the study.

The Poughkeepsie Journal reported in March that the rate of cesarean sections soared 42 percent in New York state from 1999 to 2007; one in three babies was delivered surgically in 2007, many for nonmedical reasons such as mothers’ concerns over labor and physicians’ liability fears or time constraints. At the same time, the rate of maternal mortality in the state is rising; it went up 70 percent from 1997 to 2007, the Journal found.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-04-03-multiple-births_N.htm

Mothers who deliver two or more babies are more likely to have developed moderate to severe depression within nine months of giving birth than mothers who have a single baby, say U.S. researchers who analyzed data from a nationally representative survey of children born in 2001.

“Our findings suggest that 19% of mothers of multiples had moderate to severe depressive symptoms nine months after delivery, compared to 16% among mothers of singletons,” the study’s lead author, Yoonjoung Choi, a research associate at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, said in a Hopkins news release.

http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/article/20090614/NEWS/906140356

The fully pregnant and obese woman arrived at the hospital with mild contractions. Having had at least one previous cesarean section, she delivered her newest baby surgically and without incident. On day three and four, a foul smell was detected at her wound, which was cleaned, and she was discharged.

Then, on day 10, the inexplicable occurred. The woman, who appeared fine in a clinic visit two days earlier, was found dead at home. The cause: “sepsis related to wound infection and an enlarged heart,” according to an autopsy.

To Assemblywoman Amy Paulin, a Democrat from Scarsdale in Westchester County who is concerned with rising cesarean rates, the anecdote makes a point. “It was clear that the C-section resulted in the death directly,” she said.

The woman’s story is one of three outlined cryptically in a report on 33 maternal deaths that was sponsored by the state Health Department and researched by the New York chapter of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

http://www.youtube.com/user/BigPushTube

The Big Push for Midwives YouTube Channel

The Big Push for Midwives Campaign builds state-level advocacy campaigns to license Certified Professional Midwives (CPMs) in all 50 states, D.C., and Puerto Rico, and educates national policymakers about out-of-hospital maternity care.

http://www.nursingtimes.net/whats-new-in-nursing/acute-care/regulators-set-up-european-midwives-network/5002527.article

Midwifery regulators from across the European Union are planning to set up an informal network.

This is intended to help them share fitness to practise information on midwives crossing borders, improve the exchange of best practice ideas and act together on EU legislation matters.

The network was suggested when midwifery regulators from 18 European countries met in London last month to discuss ways in which they could collaborate to enhance the safety of women and babies. The idea of the network was put forward by the French Order of Midwives and the NMC.

http://dusanwriter.com/index.php/2009/05/26/midwifery-and-counselling-gain-traction-in-second-life-media-reports/

Scoop, an independent news outlet in New Zealand, reports on the introduction of virtual education to Otago Polytechnic’s midwifery programme. First, second and third-year students will visit the government-funded SLENZ island on SL to supplement their real world learning. One of the advantages to this is that it enables students to build their education within their own community, enhancing their connection to the people they may eventually service as midwives.

http://knittedinthewomb.com/wp/?p=376

A friend expecting her second baby this coming October recently lamented to me in an e-mail:

…most of the women who go to OBs do not know – or at least believe popular misconceptions – about what midwives do. Every woman would want midwifery care for herself and baby if they knew what it truly was…. All the women I know who used midwives were women who wanted individualized care and somebody to be there to support them through their whole birth experience. Somebody who knew them and who they trusted; rather than a practice where you rotate through providers and get whoever is on call. Some had natural births, some with epidurals, etc. but the most important aspect was that relationship and better care.

http://www.bionews.zampbioworld.org/index.php/2009/05/31/23907

Midwifery Regulators from eighteen European countries have met in London to discuss ways in which they can collaborate to enhance the safety of women and babies across the EU.

Hosted by the NMC on Friday 22 May, the event was the first of its kind to bring together regulators of midwives from across the continent.

Focused on the challenges posed by EU legislation on the freedom of movement of professionals across Europe, the summit was open and interactive, and saw a high level of participation by attendees.

Read more: http://www.bionews.zampbioworld.org/index.php/2009/05/31/23907#ixzz0HKsU9mWQ&B

http://mannursediaries.blogspot.com/2009/05/nearly-bleeding-to-death-from-cesarean.html

We just had an otherwise healthy woman in our ICU who had a c-section, was sent to her room on the maternity floor, and was eventually found unresponsive with a soaking wet abdominal dressing. She was given O2 by facemask and her hemoglobin level was 4.1 (this is 1/3 normal). She was brought back to consciousness and emergently taken to the OR for exploration and possible hysterectomy. No obvious bleeding was seen, but something like 4 liters of blood were sucked out of her abdominal cavity. It was probably a slow intra-abdominal bleed, following a path of least resistance out of her c-section incision instead of her vagina. She was given 5 units of blood and 10,000 ml (!!!) of IV fluids in the OR. That’s more than five 2 liter bottles in one sitting. I’ve never heard of that much being given in my life.