Thursday, October 25, 2007
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Obstetric death of West Boca woman
Jurors weigh verdict in malpractice trial involving death of West Boca woman -- South Florida Sun-Sentinel.com:
Special's lawyers agree that her death was catastrophic. But it was entirely preventable, attorney Andrew Yaffa said.
"Susan Special's water had broken about a month early and doctors decided she should have a Caesarean because her baby was in the breech position. "
Special's lawyers agree that her death was catastrophic. But it was entirely preventable, attorney Andrew Yaffa said.
"Susan Special's water had broken about a month early and doctors decided she should have a Caesarean because her baby was in the breech position. "
Monday, October 22, 2007
Friday, October 19, 2007
Don't Sell Your Sisters Down the River - by Jan Tritten
Editorial: Don't Sell Your Sisters Down the River - by Jan Tritten
The Midwives Alliance of North America (MANA) has always been an inclusive organization, a place for all midwives. MANA's whole foundation has been one of acceptance and unity. I was shocked, therefore, when I heard that the board had proposed that only licensed, certified professional midwives (CPMs) or certified nurse-midwives (CNMs) could be voting members. This proposal reeks of a witch hunt and will cause even worse separation in our already divided movement.
Midwifery was bruised and nearly broken in New York state in the mid-1990s when direct entry and lay midwives were outlawed, then replaced, by only those midwives coming out of an "approved" direct entry program. Is MANA planning this scene for the whole country? Will MANA members simply stand by in complicity? If so, another midwifery uprising will occur, bringing forth a new surge of lay midwives who are willing to serve women in a way that we can't. The flow of the river is carrying us in a direction we will soon be unable to resist. Midwifery will be back where it was several years ago, with a strong, illegal lay midwifery movement acting as a powerful undercurrent. The midwives of MANA will represent the status quo. We will have colluded with the patriarchal medical establishment so that it is against the law to practice anything the whim of medicine decides midwives should or shouldn't do. We will be limited soon by protocols that will hamstring us into practicing watered-down midwifery and will rob women of their birthing rights.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
One of the many reasons hospital birth is dangerous.
Staph fatalities may exceed AIDS deaths - Yahoo! News:
"Most cases were life-threatening bloodstream infections. However, about 10 percent involved so-called flesh-eating disease, according to the study led by researchers at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. There were 988 reported deaths among infected people in the study, for a rate of 6.3 per 100,000. That would translate to 18,650 deaths annually, although the researchers don't know if MRSA was the cause in all cases.
If these deaths all were related to staph infections, the total would exceed other better-known causes of death including AIDS — which killed an estimated 17,011 Americans in 2005 — said Dr. Elizabeth Bancroft of the Los Angeles County Health Department, the editorial author."
"Most cases were life-threatening bloodstream infections. However, about 10 percent involved so-called flesh-eating disease, according to the study led by researchers at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. There were 988 reported deaths among infected people in the study, for a rate of 6.3 per 100,000. That would translate to 18,650 deaths annually, although the researchers don't know if MRSA was the cause in all cases.
If these deaths all were related to staph infections, the total would exceed other better-known causes of death including AIDS — which killed an estimated 17,011 Americans in 2005 — said Dr. Elizabeth Bancroft of the Los Angeles County Health Department, the editorial author."
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Nude Examinations
RestoringHealthcare.pdf
Nude examinations
Currently in vogue in western medicine is the routine giving of breast exams, pelvic exams, and rectal exams. As is often done by male doctors on female patients, women who are other men’s wives. The doctor says, “Take off your clothes,” and the client does. Do you give that kind of authority to anyone else? Some cultures in the world only allow female doctors to treat female patients. That strikes me as a wise course of action.
I am shocked by the callousness of some doctors and nurses in hospitals concerning nudity. Once, while making a pastoral hospital visit on a parishioner scheduled for surgery, I was shocked to walk through the open door of her room to find her face down on her bed, completely nude, the curtain around her bed and the door to her room both wide open for any to see. She had been prepped for surgery and left by the nurses, fully exposed and vulnerable to anyone
walking by. I immediately turned on my heel and left without her being embarrassed at knowing that I was even there. Is this kind of callous disregard for modesty and dignity what the Lord has ordained? Would YOU leave a person under your care exposed and naked and vulnerable for all to see? It would never cross my mind to do such a thing! Would it yours? What kind of crudeness and evil allows one to behave in such an ungodly manner?
Nude examinations
Currently in vogue in western medicine is the routine giving of breast exams, pelvic exams, and rectal exams. As is often done by male doctors on female patients, women who are other men’s wives. The doctor says, “Take off your clothes,” and the client does. Do you give that kind of authority to anyone else? Some cultures in the world only allow female doctors to treat female patients. That strikes me as a wise course of action.
I am shocked by the callousness of some doctors and nurses in hospitals concerning nudity. Once, while making a pastoral hospital visit on a parishioner scheduled for surgery, I was shocked to walk through the open door of her room to find her face down on her bed, completely nude, the curtain around her bed and the door to her room both wide open for any to see. She had been prepped for surgery and left by the nurses, fully exposed and vulnerable to anyone
walking by. I immediately turned on my heel and left without her being embarrassed at knowing that I was even there. Is this kind of callous disregard for modesty and dignity what the Lord has ordained? Would YOU leave a person under your care exposed and naked and vulnerable for all to see? It would never cross my mind to do such a thing! Would it yours? What kind of crudeness and evil allows one to behave in such an ungodly manner?
Restoring Healthcare as a Ministry
RestoringHealthcare.pdf
Hospital childbirth is one unnecessary “surgery.”
The following information is summarized from Healing in Zion, pages 66-67: Hospital childbirth is extremely dangerous. The United States has 9.7 deaths per thousand births; Japan has 4.4; Sweden has 5.7. The U.S. ranks twenty-second in the world in maternal and neonatal safety, ranking below every other developed nation. The safest place is Holland, and there a large percentage of babies are born at home. Worldwide, doctors handle only two out of ten attended
births. Midwives oversee the rest.
Dr. Robert Mendelsohn recites the following statistics concerning
the dangers of giving birth in a hospital: “Babies born in U.S. hospitals are six times more likely to suffer distress during labor and delivery, eight times more likely to get caught in the birth canal, four times more likely to need resuscitation, four times more likely to become infected, and thirty times more likely to be permanently injured. Their mothers are three times more likely to hemorrhage.” (Heretic, p. 91)
Dr. Murray Enkin, professor emeritus of obstetrics at Canada’s McMaster University in Ontario for ten years, researched studies published in sixty major scientific journals on childbearing. In addition,
eighteen thousand obstetricians were interviewed to obtain unpublished data. The research revealed that “Much of what our doctors and hospitals do for pregnancy and birth is wrong, expensive
and dangerous...[They] routinely employ methods of care that not only offer little benefit to mother or infant, but actually can be dangerous to them.”
He evaluated 285 procedures and policies of care, and only 100 of them were rated as successful and safe. Sixty were rated as dangerous,
and should be abandoned; eighty-eight had unknown effect; thirty-seven were possibly effective.
Home birth is definitely safer than going to a U.S. hospital. A hospital turns what God designed to be a natural process into a
surgical experience. Only 5% of births have complications which may require a doctor. Because of this 5%, any woman planning on home childbirth should have a standby plan to go to a hospital if an emergency develops.
Stories that make you cringe
Some doctors go wild while you are under their control. While writing this book, I downloaded the following article off the internet from Associated Press Writer Verena Dobnik (January 21, 2000).
“NEW YORK - A doctor delivered a baby by Caesarean section, then used his scalpel to carve his initials into the mother’s abdomen.... Liana Gredz is now suing the 61-year-old obstetrician for $5 million, saying, the 3-by-1 1/2-inch “A” and “Z” ‘makes me feel like a branded animal.’
“According to the Daily News, witnesses in the operating room said that after delivering Gedz’s daughter on Sept. 7, Zarkin announced: ‘I did such a beautiful job, I’ll initial it.’
“‘I felt like I was raped,’ she told the Daily News. And now, with the scar that has turned into a welt, ‘I’m so embarrassed
to get undressed in front of my husband because I have another man’s initials on my stomach.’
“The couple is also suing Beth Israel Medical Center, where the child was delivered.”
Hospital childbirth is one unnecessary “surgery.”
The following information is summarized from Healing in Zion, pages 66-67: Hospital childbirth is extremely dangerous. The United States has 9.7 deaths per thousand births; Japan has 4.4; Sweden has 5.7. The U.S. ranks twenty-second in the world in maternal and neonatal safety, ranking below every other developed nation. The safest place is Holland, and there a large percentage of babies are born at home. Worldwide, doctors handle only two out of ten attended
births. Midwives oversee the rest.
Dr. Robert Mendelsohn recites the following statistics concerning
the dangers of giving birth in a hospital: “Babies born in U.S. hospitals are six times more likely to suffer distress during labor and delivery, eight times more likely to get caught in the birth canal, four times more likely to need resuscitation, four times more likely to become infected, and thirty times more likely to be permanently injured. Their mothers are three times more likely to hemorrhage.” (Heretic, p. 91)
Dr. Murray Enkin, professor emeritus of obstetrics at Canada’s McMaster University in Ontario for ten years, researched studies published in sixty major scientific journals on childbearing. In addition,
eighteen thousand obstetricians were interviewed to obtain unpublished data. The research revealed that “Much of what our doctors and hospitals do for pregnancy and birth is wrong, expensive
and dangerous...[They] routinely employ methods of care that not only offer little benefit to mother or infant, but actually can be dangerous to them.”
He evaluated 285 procedures and policies of care, and only 100 of them were rated as successful and safe. Sixty were rated as dangerous,
and should be abandoned; eighty-eight had unknown effect; thirty-seven were possibly effective.
Home birth is definitely safer than going to a U.S. hospital. A hospital turns what God designed to be a natural process into a
surgical experience. Only 5% of births have complications which may require a doctor. Because of this 5%, any woman planning on home childbirth should have a standby plan to go to a hospital if an emergency develops.
Stories that make you cringe
Some doctors go wild while you are under their control. While writing this book, I downloaded the following article off the internet from Associated Press Writer Verena Dobnik (January 21, 2000).
“NEW YORK - A doctor delivered a baby by Caesarean section, then used his scalpel to carve his initials into the mother’s abdomen.... Liana Gredz is now suing the 61-year-old obstetrician for $5 million, saying, the 3-by-1 1/2-inch “A” and “Z” ‘makes me feel like a branded animal.’
“According to the Daily News, witnesses in the operating room said that after delivering Gedz’s daughter on Sept. 7, Zarkin announced: ‘I did such a beautiful job, I’ll initial it.’
“‘I felt like I was raped,’ she told the Daily News. And now, with the scar that has turned into a welt, ‘I’m so embarrassed
to get undressed in front of my husband because I have another man’s initials on my stomach.’
“The couple is also suing Beth Israel Medical Center, where the child was delivered.”
Friday, October 12, 2007
Ivanhoe's Medical Breakthroughs - Breastfeeding Protects Against Breast Cancer
Ivanhoe's Medical Breakthroughs - Breastfeeding Protects Against Breast Cancer: "The take-home message is simple. Dr. Ursin says, 'Evidence suggests that women who have children after age 25 can reduce their risk of breast cancer by choosing to breastfeed.'"
CYTOTEC - Video
WSMV.com - Video: "(4/27/07) - A drug that is given to patients at many Nashville hospitals to induce labor is specifically labeled not to be used on pregnant women."
Thursday, October 04, 2007
Become a Leader - trustbirth.com
Become a Leader - trustbirth.com
As you may already know, I am working on a book entitled Coming Home to Birth. In addition to many of your stories, I will tell my own story of how I went from being a naive, uneducated compliant patient one moment, whose only preparation had been to read Having A Baby Can Be A Scream, by Joan Rivers ——— to being a bold, determined, and very vocal woman who threatened physical harm to my obstetrician if he came close to me with anything sharper than a piece of paper. That change did not happen over months or days or weeks but within a minute. Here is the epiphany: That did not come from me, but from within me. It was already there. We are born trusting. We have to be taught not to. Trust is part of the package. We are obviously designed to give birth. We must have been born to TRUST BIRTH. We have been taught to ignore what we already know. We have been taught that birth is scary and must be left to the experts. We have been taught a pack of lies. -Carla Hartley
As you may already know, I am working on a book entitled Coming Home to Birth. In addition to many of your stories, I will tell my own story of how I went from being a naive, uneducated compliant patient one moment, whose only preparation had been to read Having A Baby Can Be A Scream, by Joan Rivers ——— to being a bold, determined, and very vocal woman who threatened physical harm to my obstetrician if he came close to me with anything sharper than a piece of paper. That change did not happen over months or days or weeks but within a minute. Here is the epiphany: That did not come from me, but from within me. It was already there. We are born trusting. We have to be taught not to. Trust is part of the package. We are obviously designed to give birth. We must have been born to TRUST BIRTH. We have been taught to ignore what we already know. We have been taught that birth is scary and must be left to the experts. We have been taught a pack of lies. -Carla Hartley
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
Birth Experiences: The Best Day of My Life
Birth Experiences: The Best Day of My Life:
"...each time I hope and pray that the woman I assist will find the path to homebirth..."
"'I am part of the homebirth movement because......... because we are too short, too tall, too thin, too small of foot, too old, too young, too wide, and our pelvises are too narrow, too small, too untried, or unproven or the wrong shape, and our uteruses are too scarred, or pointing the wrong way, or we are too multiparous, too fertile, too infertile, too female, too small, too big, too fat, too emotional, too detached, too strong, too weak, too intelligent, too well designed to birth, not designed well enough, and our vaginas are too scarred, too unproven, not stretchy enough or too stretchy, and we're too inconvenient, too unpredictable, too demanding, too informed, too loud, too messy, and our bodies labour too long or not long enough, and our cervices don't dilate 1cm an hour on command and because when you hire a surgeon you get surgery and hospitals are for sick people� and so for these and many other reasons, we are part of the homebirth movement.' - Janet Fraser"
"...each time I hope and pray that the woman I assist will find the path to homebirth..."
"'I am part of the homebirth movement because......... because we are too short, too tall, too thin, too small of foot, too old, too young, too wide, and our pelvises are too narrow, too small, too untried, or unproven or the wrong shape, and our uteruses are too scarred, or pointing the wrong way, or we are too multiparous, too fertile, too infertile, too female, too small, too big, too fat, too emotional, too detached, too strong, too weak, too intelligent, too well designed to birth, not designed well enough, and our vaginas are too scarred, too unproven, not stretchy enough or too stretchy, and we're too inconvenient, too unpredictable, too demanding, too informed, too loud, too messy, and our bodies labour too long or not long enough, and our cervices don't dilate 1cm an hour on command and because when you hire a surgeon you get surgery and hospitals are for sick people� and so for these and many other reasons, we are part of the homebirth movement.' - Janet Fraser"
News: Birth Rights and Wrongs
News: Birth Rights and Wrongs (Seattle Weekly): "She does not take issue with the mortality numbers from medical studies but says that those numbers should be weighed against the risks of induction. For one thing, she says, there's a greater chance of the need for cesarean sections with inductions, and that carries risks of fetal distress and maternal mortality."
..."Now the bottom line is, it doesn't make a difference if we did the friggin' test or not. The studies say that the tests don't improve outcome." It is, in fact, noted in medical literature that fetal monitoring in prolonged pregnancies has not been proven effective...
O'Conner has frequently alienated other health care providers. "Her professional attitude toward the pediatricians was that it was her role not only to critique our care, but to protect 'her' patients from what she considered to be our unnecessary and intrusive interference," wrote a Northwest Hospital pediatrician in a 1997 letter to the state. A similar letter came from Providence Medical Center. O'Conner does not deny the charge. "I'm pretty aggressive about how I advocate for my clients," she says. "I'm paid to do that."
..."Now the bottom line is, it doesn't make a difference if we did the friggin' test or not. The studies say that the tests don't improve outcome." It is, in fact, noted in medical literature that fetal monitoring in prolonged pregnancies has not been proven effective...
O'Conner has frequently alienated other health care providers. "Her professional attitude toward the pediatricians was that it was her role not only to critique our care, but to protect 'her' patients from what she considered to be our unnecessary and intrusive interference," wrote a Northwest Hospital pediatrician in a 1997 letter to the state. A similar letter came from Providence Medical Center. O'Conner does not deny the charge. "I'm pretty aggressive about how I advocate for my clients," she says. "I'm paid to do that."
Despite the long list of allegations against O'Conner, many of her former clients remain adamant supporters. One is Kelly Meinig, a 38-year-old mechanical engineer who had a home birth last year with O'Conner acting as a doula. "Debra was phenomenal at my birth," Meinig recalls. Though another midwife was present, it was O'Conner whom Meinig felt brought a spiritual quality to the birth. "Debra would be locked onto my hands, looking into my eyes and just intensely staying with me," Meinig says. "As ferocious as my contractions were, she was ferocious right back. I've never had that experience with any other human in my entire life."
That connection held up for the five long days in which Meinig was in labor. During that time, O'Conner essentially moved in, sleeping on a mattress by the hot tub in which Meinig eventually gave birth. Before she left, O'Conner made "refrigerator soup" so that the Meinigs would have food to eat while they were taking care of their newborn.
As O'Conner awaits a court ruling, Meinig is watching. So strongly does she feel about O'Conner that she says, "I will not have another baby unless Debra is my doula—or hopefully my midwife."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)