to think this American Obstetrician is a little extreme?

[dizietsma]

SkepticalOB

Anti homebirth, anti lactivisim, anti midwife...

Quite an insight into the highly medicalised model of birth in the US, wholly hostile to the concept of birth as a normal physiological process that need not be treated as a medical emergency.

Thank god I don't have to give birth in the US!

Now i've finally been curious enough to find out what the link says.

I think she should substitute 'This is satire.' with 'This is trite.'

excellent, Leonie

I have had a baby in the USA, and I gave birth in a private hospital attended by my own midwife (CNM). She was part of a practice of two OBs (old school male stereotype) and her.

I had to see both OBs as part of my antenatal, as they worked as a team, and decided that I would only be attended by a midwife (or OB nurse). The one progressive thing about the OBs is that they saw the need to have a midwife on staff. She was brilliant, btw.

Certified nurse-midwives are legal in all 50 states, despite the myths, and have their own hospital priveledges. They are growing in popularity as the number of doctors training to become OB-GYN diminishes (because of torts).

CNMs are very similar to British model midwives - they basically go by the research and by their own professional bodies best practice. DEMs are far more likely to be interventionist (eg using ARM).

It's incorrect to say that American women do not have a choice.

I didn't feel that I didn't have a choice. I just made a different once from 90% of other women. I understood the alternatives because I had already given birth several times in the UK.

My choices were well respected, with only a little bit of eyebrow raising by the practice nurse when I declined a 36 week swab. All of my choices were within ACOG paramenters.

I believe that most American women actively choose to go along the medical route. They are encouraged by other women to do this (and not discouraged by their doctors). It becomes a 'truth' that you need an epidural, so you sign up for one with the positive pregnancy test.

A lot of women 'try' natural childbirth and use all sorts of 'methods' (Lamaze, Bradley), but what they lack is genuine support and a lack of respect for what their bodies are actually designed to do (stuff the methods - just use the God-give one that women have been using for millenia without giving it a name and trademark). They get confused between medical and natural - eg just see natural as no pain relief, but still go along with time limits, VEs, positions, and wearing stupid hospital gowns.

Is Tauter for real! Like many on here i had to give up bf after a couple of weeks as i found my milk supply gradully dwindling till it stopped, despite feeding on demand every hour , thought that it was a supply and demand thing. I did get some support from the NHS but I dont know if that would have made any difference to my situation tbh. My dd was quite lazy sucker and did not like to work for her food so that i think was part of the problem to, even now if a straw is hard to suck she will give up, she is just 3 btw. Tauter comes across to be one of those bf matrons, very quick to judge, and to make big assumptions without knowing the parents. If i have a second dc would still like to bf but wish i discovered MN earlier.

Chibi - I referred to North America as the Canadian and US system in terms of care are very similar. I am a Canadian BTW but have also lived in the USA and now in the UK (with 7 other countries in between) so have experienced many health care systems. In Canada it is not insurance/libel driven in the same was as the USA but OB/Gyn's do look after pregnant and labouring women, not midwives. Midwives are uncommon and homebirths are exceptionally rare.

Amy Tuteur is a minor celebrity in the very narrow world of online birth choices debating, and not generally in a good way. She pops up everywhere and there are even conspiracy theories about her (she is so omnipresent in the blog/debate/comments sections that it has been suggested that she is a facade for several people employed by ACOG to create confusion online ) She used to host homebirthdebate.blogspot before they literally ran out of things to debate....but if you go there and wade into the comments section (HEAVILY edited by Amy herself I might add) you can get some kind of idea of her persona.....

Riven...sorry to hear that...it's one of those situations where I wish I'd known you living in the US. There is an obligation to take patients (Hippocratic oath and all that), so clinics, planned parenthood... there are organisations would definitely have helped you. I have two friends without insurance (in Virginia, in fact) one was high risk...both had medical care from somwhere.

Riven! GASP! My Obgyn was doing a high risk preg the same week that my son was born; she'd have taken you on for sure. So sorry you had such a rotten experience.

I also did not have insurance, the state paid for almost everything and I gave birth at a Catholic hospital which takes a number of "charity" births every year, mine being one of them. I paid for almost nothing.