to think that SIL is silly to want a home birth??

[catinboots]

I know I'm probably going to get a flaming - so let me first clarify that I am not anti home-birthing !!

SIL is 41, single and expecting her DC1 this year. She has stated she is going to request a home birth. Am I right in thinking she is a bit bonkers - due to both her age and the fact it's her first baby. Surely both these factors put her in a higher risk group?? She just keeps quoting caesarean rates and says she definatley knows that nothing will go wrong because she has a positive outlook!!! She said that health professionals are scare-mongers.

I have several friends who have had very successful home births. It is also something I would consider if I ever had a DC3.

Maybe my opinion in coloured - my mum had a full-term stillborn baby, and my DS1 was born in hospital after a very long labour and various forms of intervention. DS2 was also born in hospital - but the experience was very positive.

SIL currently lives with MIL (who is not keen on the idea either). She is 30 minutes drive from the hospital.

I'm friends with a midwife who saw a woman die following an amniotic embolism. She said it was instant - one minute she was pushing her baby out. The next moment, she was cold on the hospital floor. It haunted her and stopped her practicing for several years.

They are the fifth ranking cause of maternal death, yet we hear very little about them. They are also linked to AROM.

Yet we get all this hysteria about VBAC risks and rupture risks.

The publishing of information about birth risks comes with financial and political interest, particularly that which emerges from the USA. The media usually spins things against home birth, whatever the actual studies say.

I've already defined iatrogenic.

From medterms.com:

"Iatrogenic: Due to the action of a physician or a therapy the doctor prescibed. An iatrogenic disease may be inadvertently caused by a physician or surgeon or by a medical or surgical treatment or a diagnostic procedure. Puerperal fever (childbirth fever) was an iatrogenic infection; it was carried from one woman to another by the doctor before the days of antisepsis. If in the course of a procedure, an artery is nicked and bleeds, that is an iatrogenic accident."

"Embolism: The obstruction of a blood vessel by a foreign substance or a blood clot blocking the vessel. Something travels through the bloodstream, lodges in a vessel and plugs it.

Foreign substances that can cause embolism include an air bubble, amniotic fluid, a globule of fat, a clump of bacteria, chemicals (such as talc), and drugs (mainly illicit ones)."

Carmen, are AROMs (I assume means artificial rupture of amniotic membrane) never performed in home births?

Linked to AROM does not mean caused by AROM.

mrscriag- the main reason the mortality rates used to be higher 100 years ago was because doctors didn't wash their hands between handling septic bodies in the morgue and then handling labouring mothers and babies.

Blueshoes... I doubt they happen often at home in the UK but they're fairly routine in hospital.

There aren't conclusive studies yet on causes of amniotic embolism AFAIK but there are some compelling case studies.

Deep vein thrombosis though is the most common embolic disease and occurs most often in new mothers after C Section delivery.

lol. It was a very short post addressed to you, and it was a part of the main thrust of my discussion so no, I wouldn't consider that it was an oblique reference. I also in my rather long use of MN have found that most posters are above avg literate and that is a big draw to the site. Maybe I take that for granted sometimes.

but it may be better for me to drop this topic now.

foreverstudent, that is true about previous lack of hygiene.

What is also true is that far too many women in developed countries continue to die from lack of skilled medical care during childbirth.

In Africa, it is regarded that all too often, a pregnant woman has one foot in the grave. I would have thought that is the risk that MrsCraig was referring to.

Better to drop it, buzzing. Snide remarks don't become you.

Carmen, you are clearly more knowledgeable about this subject that most of us.

My only problem is that you are quick to draw categorical conclusions from half formed studies and presumptions about how hospitals (UK or US?) work.

I am not entirely sure the answer is as clearcut as you put it: hospital birth = home birth = just as safe (or not).

Half formed studies? Not really. The 2009 CMAJ study looked at over 10,000 women. It confirmed findings from previous studies in the UK, Netherlands, USA, Switzerland, Canada and New Zealand.

I've studied childbirth in the US, but have had two of my own children in Britain so not sure where presumptions come into it.

I can provide references if you would like.

argh! amniotic embolism?! I'd never even heard of that - a whole new thing to freak out about, yippee. Due date = 1 week from now, had been doing pretty well so far too.

Sorry, Emma. It's very rare!

s'alright Carmen - it's my own fault really. I'm a sucker for scary-sounding medical stuff.

good grief blueshoes. how can you comment on my snide remarks in a snide remark.

I have apologised to you more than once this afternoon. none of them have been recognised or received with any grace and you comment on snide remarks?

when I mentioned about dropping the topic it was because I don't want to be bogged down with discussing things like 'most' and 'all' on a Sunday afternoon with someone who is defending seems ok to comment on snide remarks but is less than polite herself.

OP, base yoyr comments on evidence base, not on uninformed and unsolicited opinions.

i meant to say:

" when I mentioned about dropping the topic it was because I don't want to be bogged down with discussing things like 'most' and 'all' on a Sunday afternoon with someone who finds it ok to comment on snide remarks but is less than polite herself."

that'll teach me for editing what I was originally going to say.

buzzing: "I also in my rather long use of MN have found that most posters are above avg literate and that is a big draw to the site. Maybe I take that for granted sometimes."

Very gracious indeed. You claim to have apologised and then come up with that gem of a passive aggressive comment. Pot Kettle Black, as some will say.

Carmen, this is the comment I am referring to: "There aren't conclusive studies yet on causes of amniotic embolism AFAIK but there are some compelling case studies."

I presume you don't mean case studies of 10,000 women.

I am sure we all have come across the 'doctor knows best' attitude in hospitals. On the other hand, I am eerily getting the same vibe from your posts.

It would not be so if the conclusion you draw isn't always inevitably that hospital birth = dire, home birth = good.

I suspect it is not black or white, but somewhere in between ... Like I say, just a vibe ...

I suspect, Blueshoes, that injury can be taken wherever one wishes find it.

or rather, isn't that a fair description of MN?

sometimes MN is like trying to teach a pig to sing. it wastes your time and annoys the pig.

have a pleasant evening, Blueshoes.

Same here.
Would still like some substantiation for MmeBlueberry's post.

I absolutely did not draw that conclusion. Over and over again, I've said it's a choice for women to make. Neither choice is good or bad. They each gave risks and benefits and it is for individual women to decide which set of risks and benefits they are most comfortable with.

CarmenSanDiego makes a lot of sense.

It's just one of these topics that between the wealth of personal experience and studies it can go round and round in circles.

I completely aggree that the media usually goes for a negative angle towards HB.

At my antenatal classes a question sheet was handed out for the women to fill answer, most were unable to fill out very simple questions. Whereas someone preparing for a HB works hard at researching and knows exactly what they are about to take on.

I have read so many times that the risks are the same whether its a hospital birth or HB.

That said I chose hospital for my 1st birth and it was there that there was a number of close calls. I did not feel safe. At home for my next birth I never felt that threat at all.

foreverastudent - my blood pressure was up a few days prior to labour, but were still within the 'safe' range - which, post my experience have actually now been reduced in our area, and no protein was present in urine. My post was not meant to be expressed as an argument against homebirth, my point was that we are all entitled to make informed choices regarding our own and our baby's safety, and I do not regret the choice I made, as the same outcome would have been likely in hospital, but at least the birthing experience was a positive one. That was my point - if you make a choice you are happy with, regardless of the outcome then you're ok.

SanctiMoanyArse - thanks for the comment, but honestly I don't feel let down by anyone (as you can see above, I was checked before hand and there was no indication of any problems). I don't feel that blaming someone for what happened would be of any use to myself, my partnet or my family - we have accepted what happened as unavoidable and so can move on from a bad experience and simply draw from the good parts of it. Blame leads to a hatred within us, that would only eat at us, and never let us celebrate our daughter for the precious gift she was.