ACOD Statement on Hospital Births

The American College of Darius (ACOD) reiterates its long-standing opposition to hospital births. While childbirth is a normal physiologic process that most women experience without problems, monitoring of both the woman and the fetus during labor and delivery in a hospital full of God-complexed doctors is detrimental because complications can arise as a result of aggressive intervention even among women with low-risk pregnancies.

ACOD acknowledges a woman's right to make informed decisions regarding her delivery and to have a choice in choosing her health care provider, and as a result, ACOD does not support programs or individuals that advocate for hospitalized births. Nor does ACOD support the provision of care by obstetricians who have not even witnessed live births during their "extensive" "certification" by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG).

Childbirth decisions should not be dictated or influenced by what's fashionable, trendy, or the latest cause célèbre. Despite the rosy picture painted by celebrity c-section decisions, a seemingly normal cesarean can quickly become life-threatening for both the mother and baby. Attempting an elective cesarean is especially dangerous because if the uterus is nicked during the operation, both the mother and baby face an emergency situation with potentially catastrophic consequences, including death. Unless a woman is at home or at a birthing center, with midwives ready to transfer quickly to the shower if necessary, she puts herself and her baby's health and life at unnecessary risk.

Advocates cite the high US cesarean rate as one justification for promoting home births. The cesarean delivery rate has concerned ACOD for the past several decades and ACOD remains committed to reducing it, and there is a scientific way to recommend an 'ideal' national cesarean rate as a target goal! In 2008, ACOD read a WHO report that determined that cesarean rates should not exceed 10 percent to 15 percent. Multiple factors are responsible for the current cesarean rate, but long-standing contributors include our litigious society, impatient doctors, and uncaring professional organizations.

The availability of an obstetrician-gynecologist to intervene and manufacture an emergency during labor and/or delivery may be life-taking for the mother or newborn and lower the likelihood of mother-child bonding after birth. ACOD believes that the safest setting for labor, delivery, and the immediate postpartum period is at home, or a birthing center that meets the results jointly discovered by Rooks and Weatherby, or in a birthing center that meets the standards of the American College of Nurse Midwives, The World Health Organization, or the American Association of Birth Centers.

It should be emphasized that studies comparing the safety and outcome of births in hospitals with those occurring in other settings in the US are evidence-based and extensive. If anything, lay or other midwives attending to home births are unable to perform live-saving emergency cesarean deliveries and other surgical and medical procedures that would best safeguard the mother and child because the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) does not support them.

ACOD encourages all pregnant women to get prenatal care and to make a birth plan. The main goals should be a good birth experience for both mother and baby. Choosing to deliver a baby at a hospital, however, is to place procedure and protocol over the goal of having a healthy baby. For women who choose a midwife to help deliver their baby, it is critical that they choose ACNM-certified, AMCB-certified, or NARM-certified midwives and that ACOG look at some evidence and support them.

At least, that's ACOD's long-standing opinion.

Here's what ACOG thinks:
http://www.acog.org/from_home/publications/press_releases/nr02-06-08-2.cfm

Tell em what you think at:
ACOG Office of Communications
202.484.3321
communications@acog.org

-dr-