Recent Comments:

  • Amy Romano: Thanks for posting this, Peggy. I am a big supporter of MANAStats, and in fact contribute data from my...
  • Peggy: The Midwives Alliance Division of Research maintains a database of (mostly) out-of-hospital births that is...
  • Amy Romano: Thanks Jill for your comments, and for welcoming me to the blogosphere, where you have held court with a...
  • Jill-- Unnecesarean: By the way, Amy, I’m really glad you’re blogging.
  • Jill-- Unnecesarean: It is actually absurd (and not in the funny way) that supporters of normalcy in birth have the...
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    Archive for the 'Midwives' Category

    Natural Born Babies: A Modern Birth Story

    Saturday, May 16th, 2009

    My email this week brought a beautiful, uplifting, happy treat.  Lorri Walker, founder and director of South Coast Midwifery, forwarded a ” modern account of today’s natural childbirth.”  Told by 10 mothers, the short film chronicles their journeys to challenge the conventional hospital birth model to give birth in their own way. Check out Natural Born Babies: A [...]

    Posted in Birth Stories, Birth and the Media, Confident Birth, Home Birth, Midwives, birth advocacy, informed decision making | No Comments »

    Why the largest study of planned home births won’t sway ACOG

    Wednesday, April 15th, 2009

    The internet is abuzz about a new study out of the Netherlands comparing the outcomes of planned home birth with those of planned hospital births in low-risk women. With over half a million women involved in the study, it is the largest of its kind. Its findings provide the best evidence to date that perinatal [...]

    Posted in Birth in Different Cultures, Home Birth, Midwives, birth advocacy, research | 4 Comments »

    What’s Behind the Cochrane? (or…, “The Good News About Midwives Gets Better!”)

    Tuesday, April 7th, 2009

    Often, the closer I look at a study, the less confident I become about the results. I’ve learned that you can’t always trust a paper’s title or abstract, and media coverage of new studies can be woefully misleading, even when it is not carefully orchestrated by those with a vested interest (which it often is). [...]

    Posted in Birth and the Media, Midwives, birth advocacy, research | 2 Comments »

    Balancing cynicism with hope

    Monday, April 6th, 2009

    I read about Susan Clarke, a young midwifery student in England, winning an award for her work in championing safe, natural birth for mothers, and I have a couple of responses. First, hurrah for Sarah, who obviously gets it and has had to stand her ground in an arena where the business of birth has [...]

    Posted in Birth Stories, Confident Birth, Home Birth, Midwives | No Comments »