Women are encouraged to have vaginal births due to…

[Undkonm]

1. cost
2. because women are not treated like men in terms of pain management

I have read (and also strongly believe) that the nhs encourages vaginal births to save money. A consultant has recently come forward to say exactly this. It is appalling and women are still falling for the narrative that vaginal birth is the only real way to give birth.

Don’t get me wrong, I know there are huge risks with all medical intervention such a c section. But I know so many people who have ended up with an emergency c section and it’s been awful for them. In contrast, those I know (including myself) who elected a c section by choice had a peaceful and largely predictable birth.

This toxic narrative that birth is only birth if you give birth vaginally is another abuse of women. I am glad I had the insight and confidence to push for what was best for me. I know other women who desperately wanted a c section but were pushed around and didn’t get to have it elected.

When will this end? I should add that I also strongly believe women who want vaginal births should be absolutely supported but it should be an active choice to do that, not the expected ‘norm.’

Do others agree? Do you have other thoughts on this? To go one step further I think the abuse of women continues when the baby arrives with huge pressure to breast feed. Just leave women alone to make decisions that are right for THEM.

I had a c-section 10 weeks ago with my 4th baby it was purely by choice and my doctor supported it

are you talking about Caesarean rates or elective ? you start of with elective c section rates then just c sections?

We get the rates from our local hospital but they are not put into elective or emergency

with regards to the increase in c sections, this is due to the rate of inductions increases - which in turn increases the emergency section rates

Elective caesarean rates at my local hospital have gone up by 60% in 5 years.

Emergency caesarean rates at this hospital are up by 40% over the same period.

And nationally caesarean rates - combined elective and emergency - have risen from 26% in England in 2014 to 38.4%, so that's roughly a 47% increase.

"with regards to the increase in c sections, this is due to the rate of inductions increases - which in turn increases the emergency section rates"

According to the ARRIVE trial, which forms a central plank of the evidence on which NICE guidance on induction is based, when it comes to inducing for post dates it doesn't increase the likelihood of a caesarean.

According to the ARRIVE trial, which forms a central plank of the evidence on which NICE guidance on induction is based, when it comes to inducing for post dates it doesn't increase the likelihood of a caesarean

24% of inductions end up as c sections

9% of pregnancies were induced in 1989
36% are induced in 2022

there is a shortage of 2500 midwives in the uk, which I believe has a bearing on the increasing numbers of inductions

The overall c-section rate at my hospital is around 40%. But when I asked for a breakdown of elective vs emergency while I was pregnant last year, I was told they no longer record this data. They said the national guidelines on tracking elective vs emergency c-sections had changed "due to hospitals purposefully trying to reduce their number of emergency Caesareans at the risk of outcomes".

Anecdotally, several ladies in my antenatal group were told they'd need to be induced - but concerned about how that might pan out, they asked for elective c-sections instead.

Anecdotally, several ladies in my antenatal group were told they'd need to be induced - but concerned about how that might pan out, they asked for elective c-sections instead.

id like to know the numbers of woman opting or asking for elective c sections when offered an induction, or given a choice

All the hospitals local to me produce this breakdown of the date - and publish them monthly on their MVP facebook pages. These stats will be collected and it's unacceptable of the hospital not to make them available to service users, or to mislead women into believing that they don't collect them.

I was induced twice. Had to have a pole stuck up me with enough force to break the water.😫Then I got the oxytocin drip which caused contractions so intense I was afraid for the baby. Each labour lasted about two hours, so that was one bright spot, but it also meant there was no time for an epidural, so I had no pain relief.
That was decades ago, so I don't know if that's still how they do it. It was horrible.

@Grammarnut because the NHS treats women like shit, so it’s very risky to have a vaginal birth with the unknowns that come with that.

@XChrome I also had the drip with DS and it took under three hours for me. DD took six hours without induction.

It bloomin’ hurts though, doesn’t it, the contractions are so intense. But I will say that my recovery was very quick, I was up and about within a few hours and felt fine the next day. I took longer to recover after DD.

I’ve heard about inductions with a balloon, sweeps, etc. , but I wasn’t offered those. I was glad to get over quickly tbh.

Interesting about your local hospitals. My hospital's MVP publishes the birth data monthly via Facebook too. But when I queried why the C-section rate isn't broken down, they just cited the change in guidelines.

I've just checked the MVP Facebook page of another local hospital and it seems they don't break down the C-section rate either.

I am not a mother but the idea of going through labour terrifies me to the point I have nightmares about it. People often seem to say "it's major surgery" but really I don't understand why anybody would choose potentially days of agonising pain, risking tears, incontinence and many of the awful things people often post about over a calm, quick elective surgery.

Every time a labouring woman is depicted on TV/in movies, they are almost uniformly screaming blue murder which has potentially exacerbated my perception and fears of childbirth. If I ever decide to become a parent, I would need the guarantee that I could have an elective c-section. I don't think I could go through 9 months of anxiety awaiting the time I'll be in the worst pain of my life. I really hope if I ever make the decision to have a family that the elective c section option will be guaranteed. I wouldn't want a HP trying to persuade me to give birth vaginally for cost reasons.

I really agree with this, especially the point in your first paragraph. I think both are true. Women are often denied elective caesareans when they want them - or at least it’s made very difficult for them to access them. But during vaginal births they are often subjected to horrible medical interventions with very limited consent - forceps, ventouse, episiotomies, etc. Anything that’s comparatively cheap and gets the baby out of the ‘right’ hole! But it results in this weird dichotomy where childbirth in this country is both under- and over-medicalised - the expensive interventions are more often denied and the cheap ones are doled out like sweets - usually at a later point in the process.

We know that a common feature of all the scandal-hit maternity hospitals - Telford, East Kent, Morecambe - was an emphasis on vaginal birth at any cost. Was it Telford that won awards for keeping its c-section rate low? With no one spotting the minor problems of women getting seriously injured and babies being left disabled or dead.

The majority of the mums I know (including myself) had C-sections and not through choice. I've always found that odd and not what I expected the norm to be.

Oh, codwollop. A vaginal birth is fine. And the best place to be is in a hospital where intervention is easy if things go wrong. Either that, or we should not have stood upright millenia ago. Giving birth in a first world nation is now safer than it has ever been in history. Being slavish about vaginal births, however, is not safe. Some women have always needed intervention - and the 21st century has the intervention that is needed.

@Grammarnut ‘a vaginal birth is fine.’

Re read the thread.

Fed up with the thread.

Go away then.

So decline the induction then
That's a choice too.

🤦Induction is done when their are signs of fetal distress, when labour is late, which can be dangerous, when the mother's health requires an immediate birth, or when the water breaks but labour does not start, which is also dangerous.
So no, it's not a choice.
Who would choose that, besides extreme masochists? It's absolute hell.

You can decline induction 'when labour is late' because the 40 weeks is a pretty artificial concept. The trial evidence shows no safety advantage of induction at 39 weeks and you can fairly safely wait up to 41 weeks. After that I would not chance it. How many peoples dates are that accurate anyway.

You can't say 'no it's not a choice' to a person who made that choice. It literally is a valid choice. I was offered an induction, declined and went into labour naturally 2 days later and had a pretty uneventful birth. She was small for dates but healthy.

Every time a labouring woman is depicted on TV/in movies, they are almost uniformly screaming blue murder which has potentially exacerbated my perception and fears of childbirth.

And they really don't need to depict them like that - thousands of women do manage to give birth without screaming their heads off.

The trial evidence shows no safety advantage of induction at 39 weeks and you can fairly safely wait up to 41 weeks.

I believe in France that they date pregnancies slightly differently so what we would call 41 weeks is more the norm.

The real question might be, if induction rates have rocketed in the past 15 years or so, are outcomes better? Have we seen a corresponding significant reduction in neonatal mortality?

Gone