The Medical Establishment’s Ridiculous Opposition to Home-Births

Friday, October 10, 2008 by: E.L. West
Tags: home births, health news, Natural News

(NewsTarget) According to ABC news, The Pennsylvania Board of Medicine raised a cease-and-desist order along with an $11,000 fine against Certified Professional Midwife (CPM) Diane Goslin last fall following the unfortunate death of an infant in her care. Though the death was not her fault, nor was it ever attributed to her handling of the infant, the Board went ahead and filed this order against Gosling anyway, citing that she was "practicing medicine and nurse midwifery without proper licensure." Fortunately, through the perseverance and petitions of satisfied patients, the order was thrown out in a five-to-two vote in the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court. Ms. Goslin was subsequently allowed to provide her much needed services to the Amish in Lancaster County, Pa., as well as others in the area who desire a home birth.

The problem, as Pennsylvania Board of Medicine claimed, was that she was a CPM, and the state only recognizes nurse-midwives, who are often unavailable for the kind of services –- home births –- that Diane Goslin performs. The objection is silly because CPMs are just as qualified to birth infants as nurse-midwives, and are actually required to attend more live births than their counterparts. Furthermore, Diane Goslin is better trained to deal with everything from breech births, to twin births, and various other complicated and tricky birth situations than a nurse-midwife, who is usually not available for home births in Pennsylvania anyway. To buttress the point even more, Goslin has delivered 5000 babies. So what was the Pennsylvania Board of Medicine's real problem with Goslin practicing? It most certainly cannot be her lack of experience.

With the qualifications that Ms. Goslin had, it seems that this situation is more about pushing the anti-home birth agenda of the major medical establishment than the qualifications of a valued certified professional midwife (CPM). This dubious action is more about pushing women into giving birth in a hospital setting.

The American Medical Association (AMA) and American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology (ACOG) have already made their position clear, that they deem home births to be unsafe, and the practitioners are in their eyes, unfit. In their opinion, the only appropriate place for low-risk births to occur is in a cold, detached hospital room. As a matter of fact, just recently (July 11) the AMA declared that it would support legislation to eliminate home births altogether, feigning true concern for patients, when their true concern lies with their pocket books.

The notion that home births (of low-risk pregnancies) are any less safe than the traditional way is without corroborated proof. In fact, a recently published study in the British Journal of Medicine found that at-home births are safe. The authors of the study, Kenneth C. Johnson and Betty-Anne Davis, found that:

"Planned home birth for low risk women in North America using certified professional midwives was associated with lower rates of medical intervention but similar intrapartum and neonatal mortality to that of low risk hospital births in the United States."

With this information, it is hard to imagine that the AMA and ACOG would still find fault with home births. Before the study was released, Gregory Philips, the ACOG spokesman, stated, "we are against home birthing, period." I wonder that if, in light of this newly published study, the ACOG would possibly reverse its views on home births and refrain from demonizing its practice.

In summary, whose right is it to tell women where they should give birth, if their pregnancies are complication-free and their midwife has the sufficient training? When the ACOG declare that women who have births outside the hospital setting are putting their infants at risk with next to no empirical data to support such a claim, they are just using sensationalism and rhetoric to discourage women from making their own decisions.

Sources:

1. (http://abcnews.go.com/Health/WomensHealth/st...)

2. (http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=534094...)

3. (http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/abstract/330/...)

About the author

Emily West is a freelance writer that focuses on topics of natural health and sustainable food production systems. She also maintains a blog, The Wordsmith, at www.journeyoutofrabbithole.wordpress.com