The Other Side of the Glass: empower fathers to protect their babies (trailer)

Grab a hanky for this heart-wrenching video!

Amazing Article

A refreshingly accurate September 11, 2008, article in the Evanston Review, "Home delivery?" by Nancy Burhop, highlights the extreme home birth maternity care shortage facing home birth families in approximately half the country, with a focus on the state of Illinois.

The article features an obstetric nurse, Aime Graimer, who chose home birth for the last two of her seven children's births. Graimer wanted to have two of her prior births at home as well, but was unable to find care:

"I was interested in having the last four at home," she said, "but that wasn't an option until the last couple of years, because I couldn't find anyone to attend the births at home."

Because the main opponents to home birth in the United States, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists did not agree to be interviewed for the article, the reporter draws some of her own conclusions:

It seems odd, then, that ACOG supports a woman's right to have an elective Caesarean section. That major surgery opens the womb to deliver the infant, and puts mother and baby at risk. The U.S. has the highest rate of Caesarean births in the world, over 30 percent and growing, according to the Center for Disease Control.

You can read ACOG's official but unreferenced Position Statement on Home Birth here, and an exchange between ACOG and a concerned obstetrician and member of ACOG asking the group to defend its position on Home Births here.

Illinois nurse-midwife, Jennifer Gagnon, CNM, one of only five nurse-midwives who attend births at home in Illinois, wonders about the opposition's extreme position against home birth and points out much better results in other parts of the world where home birth is common:

"In Europe home births are common. If hospital birth is safer, then why is it that in the Netherlands, where 34 percent are home births, they have a maternal death rate of 5 per 100,000, while the U.S. has 17 per 100,000, and 99 percent of our births are in the hospital?"

There are four sidebars that accompany the article. (They appear as links to "Related Stories") Of particular interest is the "Just Asking," in which author Burhop reveals that both ACOG and the American Medical Association declined requests to be interviewed for the article. Both ACOG and the AMA have vowed to lobby against laws to license Certified Professional Midwives (CPMs). Gainer lists four questions that she would have posed to the groups:

• What do you recommend for women who, for personal, monetary, cultural or religious reasons, don't want to have their baby in a hospital?


• What if a woman lives in a rural area far from a hospital? Wouldn't it be better to have a certified midwife in attendance?


• Are you looking at the consequences of all the intervention that goes on in hospital births to see if there are ways to reduce Caesareans and encourage more natural childbirth, with women in control of what happens to them?


• With obstetricians and gynecologists leaving Illinois in droves due to out-of-control liability insurance costs, wouldn't licensed midwives be a welcome addition to the field ?

ACOG's silence is deafening. As the trend to license CPMs picks up steam (with four more states gaining legal recognition in as many years), ACOG went running to its "big brother," the American Medical Association (AMA). In response to ACOG's requestion, the AMA passed the now infamous Resolution 205 vowing to lobby against CPM licensure. (Download the Word Document of AMA's Resolution here.)

Neither physicians group offers any practical solution to the maternity care crisis facing home birth families across the United States.

Labor Day Meme!

I've never done a meme before but couldn't resist, it being Labor Day and all ...

First, a hat tip to Rocks in my Drier for starting this Labor Day meme!

• How long were your labors? 

#1 --  24-36 hours 
#2 -- 4.5 hours
#3 -- Not sure how to answer b/c labor stalled in the middle. Technically, 4-5  hours, but I had about 1 hour of early labor, stalled for a couple hours, and then once it resumed a little over 2 hours until he was born.

• How did you know you were in labor? 

#1 -- it was a gradual start with menstrual-like rhythmic contractions.
#2 -- after a week of prodromal labor, contractions started fast and furious.
#3 -- strong menstrual-like rhythmic contractions that suddenly stopped after an hour. Midwife checked me, and I was at 2. Midwife thought it would be several more hours. After a nice quiet massage from DH, though, they roared back into a very fast pace.

• Where did you deliver?

All at home ...

#1 -- tried to do a water birth but water cooled off and I had to get out

#2 -- tried to do a water birth but didn't have time to fill up tub (thought it would be long again. Heh)

#3 -- finally had a water birth, but it still hurt like heck! (His hand was up by his face when he delivered, and he was 9 lbs. 3 oz.)

• Drugs?

No. I know they're really bad for the baby, and I realized that only by being at home where (1) drugs aren't available, and (2) natural labor is better supported, would I be able to do what's best for the baby and avoid all drugs and/or anesthesia.

• C-section? 

Thank Goddess, no! But I'm sure the first birth would have been if I'd been in the hospital. She was asynclitic and posterior, and I had a very long labor.

• Who delivered?

Midwives at all of them (sort of), in this order:

#1 -- Direct Entry Midwife 

#2 -- Certified Professional Midwife, but technically, DH "caught" him with midwife off to the side. This was my orgasmic birth!

#3 -- Certified Nurse-midwife (who had been apprentice trained first before going to CNM school)

More on ACOG's campaign against midwives

First, let me explain where the "number two" came in, b/c I'm not sure how clearly that press release explained it...

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) is a private trade union representing America's OB's.  ACOG, along with state doctors' groups around the country, have been spending millions of dollars to fight licensure of home birth midwives, and they've been losing! ACOG just announced their 2008 legislative agenda, and on the state level it's no surprise that Midwives and Home Birth are listed as their second priority. (If you ask me, on a state level, we are their first priority, b/c we often hear from friendly legislators that we are usually the first thing their hired guns bring up when they see them.)

Here's what ACOG says about Midwives and Home Birth:

"Lay" Midwives and Home Birth

We [ACOG] are seeing an increase in home birth and lay midwife bills across the country. Different tiltes for midwives and different levels of training foster public confusion and legislators often cannot distinguish between different types of midwives. Least - qualified midwives are gaining licensure as more and more states adopt the certified professional midwife (CPM) credential for licensure and not the certified midwife (CM) credential which ACOG recognizes.

TRANSLATION OF ACOG'S STATEMENT 

"We are the OBs trade union, and we are hopping mad that women want to give birth without paying into our multi-billion dollar industry, So we're going outspend those consumers who are trying to get their midwives licensed and throw all our political clout around, hoping some of our lies stick."

THE TRUTH OF THE MATTER

Some women are going to give birth at home, regardless of the smear campaign and lies of ACOG, but in half of the U.S., women choosing home birth face a real problem: lack of licensure for the most common home birth provider, certified professional midwives (CPMs). Despite good, scientific evidence that CPMs provide excellent, safe home birth care, ACOG is more concerned with protecting their turf than helping all women access good safe childbirth care.

But what about this "CM" ACOG mentions in their statement? First, CMa are hospital trained, and only about 50 CMs exist in the entire country (compared with more than 1,300 CPMs who are actually educated and trained specifically for out-of-hospital birth). 

Or what about nurse-midwives (CNMs)? Nurse-midwives are not trained for home birth either (in fact, it used to be forbidden even to discuss home birth in CNM educational programs until very very recently). For the most part, CNMs just don't do home birth! (with very few individual exceptions) Only about 1% of CNM attended births take place at home, down from from approx 2% in 1990 at a time when total births are on the rise for CNMs. The trend is fewer home births for CNMs, not more.

So what's a home birth mama to do. in half of our country? Hire an underground midwife, who is then less able to access collaborative care if it becomes necessary? Hire an underground midwife whose qualifications are hard to verify? Go it alone? Hire a midwife from another state and hope and pray she makes it on time? THOSE ARE ALL UNACCEPTABLE! That's why it's paramount that all 50 states license CPMs, and the sooner the better!

WE'RE NUMBER TWO!

A press release from the Big Push for Midwives Campaign ...

PushNews from The Big Push for Midwives Campaign
CONTACT: Steff Hedenkamp, (816) 506-4630, steff@thebigpushformidwives.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Monday, September 1, 2008

Number Two With a Bullet

Critical Women’s Health Issues Neglected as Physician Group Yet Again Sets its Sites on Midwives

WASHINGTON, D.C. (September 1, 2008)—In the newest phase of its ongoing effort to deny women the right to choose their maternity care providers and birth settings, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) has announced that eliminating access to midwives who specialize in out-of-hospital birth is now the second most important issue on its state legislative agenda. This move puts restricting access to trained midwives ahead of such critical issues as contraceptive equity, ensuring access to emergency contraception, and the prevention and treatment of perinatal HIV/AIDS.

“ACOG claims to be an advocate of women’s health and choice, but when it comes to the right to choose to deliver your baby in the privacy of your own home with a Certified Professional Midwife (CPM) who is specifically trained to provide the safest care possible, ACOG’s paternalistic colors bleed through,” said Susan M. Jenkins, Legal Counsel for the Big Push for Midwives Campaign. “It is astonishing that an organization that purports to be a champion of women’s healthcare would put a petty turf battle that affects less than one percent of the nation’s childbearing women ahead of pressing issues that have an impact on nearly every woman in this country. If this is not dereliction of duty, I can’t imagine what is.”

In recent years, ACOG has led a well-financed campaign to fight legislative reforms that would license and regulate CPMs and has now teamed up with the American Medical Association (AMA) to promote legislation that would prevent families from choosing to give birth at home. Despite these joint efforts, the groups have not been successful in defeating the groundswell of grassroots activism in support of full access to a comprehensive range of maternity care options that meet the needs of all families.

“Wisconsin is a good example of what ACOG and the AMA are up against,” said Jane Crawford Peterson, CPM, Advocacy Trainer for The Big Push. “Our bipartisan grassroots coalition of everyday people from across the state managed to defeat the most powerful and well-financed special interest groups in Wisconsin, all on an expenses-only budget of $3000 during a legislative session in which $47 million was spent on lobbying. When you try to deny women the fundamental and very personal right to choose where and how to give birth, they will get organized and they will let their elected officials know that restrictions on those rights cannot stand.”

Noting these successes, ACOG has recently launched its own grassroots organizing effort, calling on member physicians to recruit their patients to participate in its “Who Will Deliver My Baby?” medical liability reform campaign.

“ACOG itself admits that we’re facing a critical shortage of maternity care providers,” said Steff Hedenkamp, Communications Coordinator for the Big Push. “They certainly realize that medical liability reform is nothing more than a band aid and that increasing access to midwives and birth settings is critical to fixing our maternity care system and ensuring that rural, low-income and uninsured women don’t fall through the cracks. Midwives represent an essential growth segment of the U.S. pool of maternity care providers, but instead of putting the healthcare needs of women first, ACOG would rather devote its considerable lobbying budget to a last-ditch attempt to protect its own bottom line. This is not a happy Labor Day for our nation’s mothers and babies.”

The Big Push for Midwives (http://www.TheBigPushforMidwives.org) is a nationally coordinated campaign organized to advocate for regulation and licensure of Certified Professional Midwives (CPMs) in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, and to push back against the attempts of the American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists to deny American families access to safe and legal midwifery care. The campaign plays a critical role in building a new model of U.S. maternity care delivery at the local and regional levels, at the heart of which is the Midwives Model of Care, based on the fact that pregnancy and birth are normal life processes. Media inquiries: Steff Hedenkamp (816) 506-4630, steff@thebigpushformidwives.org.

# # #

The Big Push for Midwives Campaign is fiscally sponsored by Sustainable Markets Foundation, a not-for-profit organization recognized as tax-exempt under Internal Revenue Code section 501(c)(3). The mission of the Big Push for Midwives is to build winning, state-level advocacy campaigns towards successful regulation and licensure of Certified Professional Midwives (CPMs) in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.

Visit the Big Push for Midwives Campaign on the Web at www.TheBigPushforMidwives.org.

Sustainable Markets Foundation | 80 Broad Street, Suite 1600 | New York, NY 10004-2248

The Big Push for Midwives Campaign | 2300 M Street, N.W., Suite 800 | Washington, D.C. 20037-1434