I want to know WHY you think women request ELCS?
Do you want to quote the NICE guidelines on ELCS?
And more importantly, the reasoning behind them? And what NICE said about the cost effectiveness and health economics of maternal request ELCS?
The thing is you won't because you can't and because you are spouting so much UTTER UTTER BOLLOCKS on this thread.
Let me enlighten you.
NICE decided that any women who wants an ELCS should be allowed one BECAUSE TO NOT DO SO COULD BE POTENTIALLY MORE HARMFUL TO THE HEALTH OF THAT WOMAN as ELCS in this country were now comparatively sage.
That's right. They evaluated that it could be bad for health not to do ELCS on the NHS.
When they did the evaluation they looked into the research available about why women ask for ELCS. Contrary to that well know Medical Journal known as the Daily Mail, they found they women who asked for an ELCS were not 'too posh to push'. They were overwhelmingly in a vulnerable group - they were statistically more likely to have be raped / sexually assaulted or suffer from mental health issues for example. Thus making it even more critical that their cases were treated with care or sensitivity. They were more likely to be older - and therefore more at risk of complications, more likely to be planning a smaller family - and therefore additional risks from subsequent pregnancies were potentially less of an issue, more likely to have gone through fertility treatment and were often very well informed / educated on the subject and well aware of the risks of having an ELCS. They were also far more likely to have had a previous traumatic birth experience which had, had a lot term impact on them either mentally or physically.
Remembering at all times that the remit of NICE is also to consider - and to effectively ban the NHS from using treatments that are not cost effective this is what they concluded about cost.
They looked at the costs, including the long term costs to the NHS from complications and felt strongly and I quote here "cost alone should not be used as a justification for refusing an ELCS" as it was economically cost effective. Looking at continence issues alone they real cost difference between an ELCS and a VB was substantially smaller than other analysis show. In fact, they highlighted the fact that if we wanted to go and have the most cost effective option for the NHS, then EVERYONE should have an ELCS as at a certain rate of ELCS this was cheaper than VBs. Yet they of course said they would never advocate this. Indeed, when they pointed out that the costs of denying an ELCS and damaging someone's mental health were considered there was a real case to be answered financially.
So yes, next time you SPOUT BOLLOCKS on this subject please consider who you are actually attacking and whether your argument has anymore merit than hot air from celebrity mags, because it just doesn't.
There are some weaknesses in the NICE guidelines. They notably don't properly look at risks for women who have already had one child or planning to have another in the future (but still concluded that ELCS overall were on balance a safe procedure - noting that risks for CS in general were stacked in EMCS).
They also point out that little to no research has been carried out to assess whether any form of counselling is effective (they point out that some that is currently being used could actually be harmful too as a result).
Anyway, I'd still like to hear why you think women should be refused an ELCS together with research into why it is a more effective approach than denying access to ELCS.
Alternatively if you would like to educated yourself, the NICE guidelines can be found in full here www.nice.org.uk/guidance/cg132/evidence. Read from about page 100.
For the record, I don't think that ELCS ARE the solution for everyone. Better care during pregnancy and childbirth, particularly in mental health support, would be more appropriate for some. There IS a growing attitude that an ELCS is almost a 'magic solution' to problems, which it may well not be. The problem being that granting ELCS is coupled without ALSO providing mental health support, which in many cases is crucial OR it is made compulsory thus making the process incredibly and unnecessarily stressful. (More support and simply extra contact with midwives can be enormously beneficial to mental health, even if there is no mental health focus). In part this is because so many NHS Trusts have NO Maternal Mental Health support at all. Which is utterly scandalous, though thankfully has been picked up by the recent Maternity Review (which again has gaps imho).
Otherwise, please do one and keep your damaging ignorance to yourself.
OP, I will simply say, the reaction your post has had today is highly unusual. This section is usually a lot more enlightened and not judgemental at all. There is no 'right' or 'wrong' in an ELCS only what is most appropriate for you. As there is in every aspect of health care, which isn't usually assessed for its morally in the same way as childbirth.
In deciding that, your reasoning is important, especially if you want some advise here. If you feel able to share, you WILL get good advice.