to think if my home birth service is suspended, i should be allowed to transfer to another home birth team?

[rednosedreindeerhead]

My hospital has just announced it's suspended it's home birth service. I hate hospitals and was quite definitely and massively up for a home birth in 6 weeks time....

Prior to this, seeing how my hospital was struggling, I already enquired at another hospital nearby whether I might transfer to their home birth team, but they said no on postcode grounds, which I totally understand. But if a service is actually then suspended for sure is it unreasonable to suggest that the tiny amount of women who would like to give birth at home in that time frame be allowed to transfer to another home birth team?

If a hospital nearby had the capability, and the space to at least say that they would try and send someone to my house, shouldn't that be allowed, maybe by law? I feel pretty strongly that it is my right to give birth in my own home....

You have a right to give birth at home on the NHS. When I had DS2 at home the midwives attached to my GPs practice could not attend as I had moved out of their catchment area (GP was happy to keep us on his general list) After a couple of other GP practices were unable to help because of staff holidays etc. I wtoe to the head of midwifery at the hospital explaining that I intended to give birth at home and reminding her of the requirement to provide a midwife. She arranged a community midwife from the next town along to attend me and on the day of the birth the midwife from my GP practice came along as second midwife as it was a water birth. I'm not sure if they still exist but an organisation called AIMS had a template letter I used, and all went very well. It was worth the trouble in making arrangements as the birth went very smoothly and DS1 was able to be there, I'm sure this is one of the reasons that they have always got on so well.

Our dogs were in the next room and also met DS2 before he was an hour old, so we had none of the problems in introducing them either.

tanmu instead of going to the US, why don't you go to the Netherlands for your birth experience? HB is standard choice for uncomplicated pg (30%), if you have to go to the hospital (or indeed choose to go), 1-2-1 care is standard. after birth you can choose to have kramzoorg service, where a professional nurse not only will help you to establish breastfeeding and show how to look after a newborn, s/he will also help the family with light cooking, cleaning and looking after the older siblings, all for up to 8 days postnatal...

why do we have to constantly compare ourselves with substandard antiwomen service in the US, rather than with a country that provides its women and newborns with decent service, all free at the point of care and paid for from the tax system... is because it is an uncomfortable truth that not all is so great over here?

You have a right to give birth at home.

Agree with all the others who say, inform then that you WILL be doing so - giving them plenty of time to sort out the problems that THEY have created for you.

They can suspend their home birth service all they like. That doesn't mean that you are obliged to suspend your plan to give birth in the safest and most positive setting that you can. Home births are safest for low-risk mothers. Their actions are damaging and wrong.

If more people did this, resources for maternity care would have a better chance of becoming the greater priority that they need to be.

Definitely write to head of midwifery explaining that you are planning for a HB still and you expect them to provide staff as in the NICE regs. the homebirth.org site has lots of great information to help you.

If you feel strongly enough, then you can always insist that you will give birth at home and if the hospital refuse to provide assistance then you will call an ambulance at the appropriate point. I'm not saying this is an advisable plan or that you have to follow through, but playing hardball may get you what you want.

I had a great HB with fabulous midwives and I would recommend it for low-risk mothers in a heartbeat. Personally, if I'd have had to go to hospital, I would have been ridiculously stressed and I'm sure the birth wouldn't have gone nearly so well. It is not selfish to insist on the most appropriate birthing conditions for you and your child, particularly when study after study consistently shows that HB costs the NHS less than a hospital birth.

If the problem at the hospital is a shortage of midwives, then you might like to consider signing this e-petition, asking David Cameron to honour his promise to recruit extra midwives.

epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/13716

YABU!
If your local team is up and running then that is fair enough. But there is obviously a reason you don't have the facilities locally. I don't think it's fair for you to expect a midwife to be taken off duty from a hospital to cater to you!

If I would of attempted a home birth then me & DS would of died, and I'm a young healthy person who had no complications during pregnancy.

That doesn't mean the same is the case for everyone.

bemybebe personal taxation is higher in the Netherlands so they prob have more money invested in healthcare. The main point I was trying to make however, is that there are finite resources. And here that means most of what we need, but not all of what we want. Like I said, in an ideal world, that kind of care in the Netherlands would be available to ALL women, all over the world.

JAMW

Please, the "if I'd HB my baby would have died" should not be rolled out here. It is NOT an argument against homebirth. Babies die in hospital because of neglect by staff who are over burdened. This does not mean everyone should therefore birth at home.

Please remember that HB is the safest option for a low risk woman. Just being in hospital introduces risks that wouldn't have happened at home.

Furthermore, while it is POSSIBLE that in your case, your baby would have died at home, in MOST cases where people believe this in actual fact it's not true. No, I am not saying I disbelieve you personally, I'm saying that where what was an apparently low risk mother and ultimately a traumatic and near-death birth, in most cases there are several things to consider:

1. What caused the conversion from low risk to trauma? Sometimes it's interventions that wouldn't happen at home that cause the conversion in the first place.
2. Homebirthing midwives are quite capable of dealing with all emergencies and will transfer if required. A planned homebirth does not always lead to an actual homebirth.

It IS reasonable to expect the safest form of care available. In any other care/health setting we would never say "oh, I'll take second best because I don't want to bother to doctors or cost the NHS extra for that life-saving drug".

I had a midwife to myself in hospital on NHS but I was induced, had obstetric cholestasis and had already had a 38 week still birth so they were taking no chances with me - I was deemed high risk but that was no surprise

tanmu82 finite resources - absolutely. Therefore let's spend them more wisely and have more homebirths which cost the NHS less than the equivalent (non-instrumental, none-interventional) hospital birth.

Not only that but they cost MASSIVELY less than instrumental or surgical births, many of which are caused by the mother being in hospital in the first place.

Win-Win.

organicarrotcake the still birth was a "low risk" home birth - just in case it has any impact on your view :(. They told me that if she'd been born in a hospital they might well have saved her.

'i guess it isn't my right on the NHS'

Imagine the outcry if a mum was told she HAD to give birth at home because the hospital was too busy to take her and all other nearby hospitals said no as well.

OP - contact the HOM at your local hospital, AIMS, the supervisor of midwives, and the chief executive of the trust. Threaten to have an unassisted birth. Tell them you are phobic about hospitals and simply won't go in. Tell them you're contacting the local paper to discuss your story.

I vouch they will send the HOM around to deliver your baby.

In our area a mum expecting twins had the HOM and the SOV out to deliver her babies at home when she refused to come into hospital to give birth.

"Don't you think it is a bit unfair for women to expect a midwife to themselves on the NHS if they choose to give birth at home?"

Don't you think its unfair (not to mention bordering on dangerous) that women have to share a midwife with 3 other women if they choose to give birth in a hospital??

organiccarrotcake the thing is, not every wants or can have a hb. I never wanted one and I know others who did, but for medical reasons/last minute complications couldn't.

it would take massive campaigning (think BF) and it still may not be the first choice for a lot of women. How do you get to the point where it is the norm to have hb's?

the birth rate in the UK is at a record high and according to RCM there has been an increase in complex cases - so demands on midwives have been increasing. How do you make hb a priority where 2 midwives are needed, when midwife numbers are stretched?

"personal taxation is higher in the Netherlands so they prob have more money invested in healthcare"

As we are not the expert in taxation in the Netherlands, I don't know it, you don't know it (although I can tell you that mortgage is tax deductible in Holland, so it is not good just looking at headline numbers. My point at finite resources is that there are plenty of areas that NHS should look at and stuffing levels during labour is ABSOLUTELY NOT ONE OF THEM. The argument that women should just suck it up is offensive to me.

AIMS are wonderful, I sobbed at talked to Beverly when I was being railroaded into uneccessary intervention with DC3. She talked me through everything and I managed a successful hb (my second) attended by the two top CMW as it was NYE and everyone else was off. I am very, very glad that I stuck to my guns.

"Don't you think it is a bit unfair for women to expect a midwife to themselves on the NHS if they choose to give birth at home?"

I think it is immoral to force an individual making healthcare choices about their own health and the life of their unborn baby based on such a twisted notion of "fair".

thankyou so much everyone for your time, help and advice. this has been a really useful thread for me to read.

I have my first meeting tonight with the doula that we had hired (to assist with our homebirth....! ooops ) so I will be bringing up loads of this stuff with her. She seems to know her stuff so it will be interesting what she now thinks we should try. The AIMS website is really useful so I might go down the letter writing route first before looking into the possibility of transferring hospitals to a better MLU. (My hospital has one, but again, they are understaffed and overworked and the MLU is frankly, not the best....)

anyway thankyou so much for being calm and collected and helping me out. I really appreciate it.

good luck red

Good luck. I know in my local area they suspended home births in September and the service is still suspended. It's been in all the local papers etc but to no avail. Somehow I can't see the service ever being reinstated.

Indeed: homebirth is the cheapest way for you to give birth.

and you have the right to be attended by an NHS HCP

on staffing: MLUs have higher staffing levels and still cheaper per birth

an average consultant salary is more than 4* average MW....

hope it works out for you OP.

This thread is making me want a home birth and I'm not even pregnant. And I'm single!

I believe there's a good chance I wouldn't have ended up with an EMCS if I'd been at home. I had chosen to give birth in hospital at the time though.

As an aside, how much of a fight would I have to get a home birth after having had an EMCS?

Good luck rednosed.

rednosedreindeerhead - sorry, have been offline since I posted and only just checked back. It was touch and go because I was really exhausted when I started labour. I'd had a horrible midwife appointment earlier in the day to have a sweep and she'd really upset me by getting me all panicky and telling me that there was no way I'd get a home birth and calling the hospital to book an 'emergency consultant appointment' and an induction as I was already 9 whole days overdue and hadn't yet had a sweep, despite me already having agreed with my regular midwife that I didn't want a sweep until that point and that I wouldn't be having an induction. She totally ignored me when I said that I'd had a show and thought things were starting anyway and still went ahead with all the scaremongering.

So I went home and grumped and cried all afternoon rather than eating and napping like I usually did. So then by the time labour got going that night I'd been up all day and hardly eaten anything, so was running on empty. DP and DSis kept feeding me little squares of crumpets and toast and honey, which kept me going, but by the time it came to the second stage, I was really knackered and the contractions were giving up. The midwife was massaging my bump to create more contractions and feeding me serving-spoonfuls of honey (I managed to eat an entire jar of honey) and yelling at me 'go on ye girl ye, this'll keep you out of the hospital!' (imagine a really hard Irish woman).

They kept saying things along the lines of 'if she hasn't fully dilated within an hour then we'll have to transfer her', and then leaving me for two hours. I think it was partly psychological as they knew I really wanted to stay out of the hospital so kept threatening me with that to make me get a move on.

Apart from avoiding a whole load of intervention which may have seemed necessary but wasn't, I'm sure it meant that I recovered quicker from the birth and bonded better with my little girl as the two of us, along with DP and DSis (and even one of the midwives for a bit!) got straight into our own bed (and hardly got out of it for the next two weeks!). Not to mention the cost saving to the NHS on bed-space, anaesthatists, drugs, obstetricians and whatever else we'd have ended up having while we were there.

Oh, and if you do get your lovely home birth, I'd recommend an old duvet - nice and comfy to lie on, can be rolled up into a support, and very absorbent for the various bodily fluids that will be flying around!

(sorry that was long. I can be very long when it comes to this particular topic!)

dobeessneeze Now THAT is the kind of midwife I want when I'm having this baby (the one you had at home, not the one you saw earlier in the day!)