does anyone know....

[orangehead]

where to get advice regarding your rights during childbirth? Help would be much appreciated, thanks.

I would suggest your first port of call is your MW or local health authority as some areas have different policies i think.

AIMS

and mumsnet !

anything in particular you are thinking about?

Orangehead - your rights are to refuse any treatment you don't want, to be given information on any treatment or procedure offered, to give birth at home and be attended by a midwife if you want to, oh and obviously, your baby is afforded the same rights once it is born - note it has no legal rights until expelled from the vagina.

But AIMS is a good place to start.

So who has told you what to do and what are they suggesting?

Thankyou all. It is actually for a friend, I feel relucant to go into too much detail as she is a very private person. She has previously had a stillborn and she is preg again, just entered last trimester. She is a total mess as you can imagine. Her and her consultant are arguing over when she should be induced. For the sake of literally a few days to save her sanity, but he is not budging. She feels that surely as a parent she should have more say

Hmm, well couple of things - does she have the butterfly sticker on her file? Her consultant may not actually be aware of the stillbirth. They often don't read the file But the midwives normally notice the sticker and give the consultant a kick.

If the stillbirth was thought to be because of a failed placenta last time you can understand why they are concerned. However she doesn't necessarily need to be induced anyway. There are lots of options, waiting to see, even having an elective caesarian if it is the induction she's really nervous about. I know having had an induction, if I had to have another I'd yell 'section stat' and lie down in an operating theatre rather than be submitted to the generalised poking of an induction.

She can ask for active monitoring if she goes overdue and she will be offered a scan once a week (at least) and electronic fetal monitoring every few days.

The other side of things is avoiding premature induction, if she is sure of her dates and he is pushing for an earlier induction than say 38 weeks, she is right to stand her ground IMHO.

I hope things work out for her.