Midwives: Your Best Bet!
Yvonne Lapp Cryns
History
In 1900 half of all Americans were born into the hands of a
midwife, at home. Early studies comparing the birth outcomes of
physicians versus midwives showed that midwives had fewer
maternal and infant loses than the doctors. The United States
had a very high percentage of maternal deaths compared to other
countries.
Reports done by the White House Conference on Child Health and
Protection, the national Committee on the Costs of Medical
Care, and the New York Academy of Medicine in the 1930's all
concluded that midwives were safer than physicians. These
reports chastised doctors for their frequency of interventions
which led to problems. Many physicians, in response to the
findings of the reports, placed the blame on the midwives
claiming that midwives were "ignorant", "dirty", untrained and
a threat to the safety of childbearing women. Medical journals
and popular magazines contained many articles bashing midwives
and blaming them for the nations appalling maternal mortality
and infant mortality rates. Many physicians and public health
advocates spoke up for the midwives and their excellent
statistics, but the prestige of the anti-midwife physicians and
the strong push to move births into the hospitals far
over-shadowed their voices. This barrage of anti-midwife
articles and propaganda continues today despite the lack of any
studies or statistics to prove claims that physicians guarantee
the safest outcomes or healthier babies or mothers.
What do the Statistics Show?
Every valid study to date has shown that midwife-attended birth
is at least as safe as physician-attended birth. Additionally,
those who have a midwife-attended birth can expect to have
fewer interventions of all kinds. In the early 1970's only 0.5%
of all births were attended by midwives, but in 1980 this grew
to 2.1% and in 1990 to 3.9%*. Infant mortality, IM, is one
criteria for assessing safety of births. The most general use
of the term includes infant deaths from birth to the first
birthday. 1990 statistics from the Center for Disease Control
show that Direct Entry Midwives had the lowest IM, half that of
M.D.'s.
Click on this link to see the stats chart on my website:
http://www.midwives.net/hsh/your_best_bet.html
* Undoubtedly the number of births attended by midwives of all
kinds is higher. In some states, nurse-midwives mainly work as
employees under physicians and the insurance companies pay more
for a physician attended birth. In order to receive the largest
monetary compensation for births, and because the midwife is
"under physician supervision" by law, the birth certificate is
completed as through the doctor were attending, even if this
was not the case. Additionally, in states where Direct Entry
Midwives are not licensed or Direct Entry Midwifery is
prohibited, many births either go unreported or are reported as
unattended or the category of midwife is absent from the birth
certificate. Statistics from Center for Disease Control, US
Birth Cohort of 1990, Table 43, May 18, 1995.
About The Author: Yvonne Lapp Cryns is the owner of Midwives
.net - http://www.midwives.net
Yvonne is the co-founder of
Nursing Programs Online at http://www.nursingprogramsonline.com
and a contributor to The Compleat Mother Magazine at
http://www.compleatmother.com . Yvonne is also a law school
graduate, a registered nurse and a Certified Professional
Midwife.
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