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 Study shows Home births are as safe as hospital births
Source: Matt Ramsey, CanWest News, Service Canada.com Date: 11/29/07
Some things -- like stripping naked, making breakfast and sipping coffee in the buff -- are better done at home.
Comfort and privacy are the primary reasons Euphemia and I are opting for a home birth assisted by midwives.
Unfortunately,
domestic delivery for anything more than a pizza is often viewed with a
skepticism bordering on reproach, which is why I find myself in a
position potentially as hazardous as buck-naked bacon-making.
Home
birth is dirty, we are told, dangerous for mother and baby, you'll have
to sterilize the house, boil the cats in bleach, etc., and even then
you're taking a huge risk. It hurts too much to do it without drugs.
Plus you'll annoy the neighbours. You're a crazy hippie, global warming
is a myth and your mother dresses you funny.
A year-long study in
1999 (reported in the Canadian Medical Association Journal) comparing
outcomes between home and hospital births among B.C. women able to
choose between the two found: nothing.
Fewer interventions during
labour for home birthers, fewer maternal infections, fewer episiotomies
and no significant differences in perinatal mortality. Oh, and because
women who are able to birth at home typically stay there, homestyling
is cheaper, too.
The study concludes: "There was no increased
maternal or neonatal risk associated with planned home birth under the
care of a regulated midwife."
Studies in New Zealand, the U.K.,
U.S., Switzerland and the Netherlands have made similar conclusions --
home birth with qualified caregivers is as safe as birthing in a
hospital. Last week, a study indicated women who choose caesarean
section without medical necessity face a five-fold risk of postpartum
cardiac arrest over natural birth; wound infection rates were five
times higher.
Pregnancy is not an illness and we are not going to
treat it as such. If we need to go to hospital to safeguard mother or
baby's health then we will go and do whatever is needed.
In the meantime, the coffee is on and the curtains are drawn at home -- where women gave birth long before there were hospitals.
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