The Truth of Hospital Birth
~ Why Hospital Is Not An Ideal Place
To Have A Natural Childbirth

Hospital birth ... which woman does not want to give birth at a hospital in these days and age ? Ask any pregnant woman where she is planning to give birth, and you will find that 99% of them will answer: hospital.

Yup!

Hospital has been the first choice for women who are planning to give birth. Women choose to have their babies in hospitals because they are afraid not to. They think that having a baby is like undergoing a major medical event so that they feel safe to be close to modern technology and a skilled obstetrician. They are equally scared that if they don't have a hospital birth, then they or their babies would die. In short, women no longer trust their body to give birth, despite the fact that it has been shown throughout centuries that women's bodies are perfectly suited to give birth.

It is very rare, that a woman asks herself whether labor and childbirth are really life threatening and dangerous. This is because all women today are being bombarded practically from childhood to womanhood by the message that childbirth is dangerous. The fact that media portray that childbirth is full of complications and that most women will need medical help to give birth helps to reinforce this myth.

But, nothing is further than the truth, because for most women, labor and childbirth are normal events.

Labor And Childbirth Are Normal Events

Women who are normal and have low risk pregnancies should be able to give birth naturally if they are given correct information and training on how to do so. One of the proponent of natural birth and the founder of husband-coached childbirth method, Dr. Bradley, once asserted that at least 90% of women are low risk and should be able to give birth naturally, or without intervention (including c-section, pain killer, and forceps/vacuum extraction).

Most Childbirth Complication Are Iatrogenic

Complication and/or horrible childbirth experiences that some of these supposedly low risk women experiencing are not caused by their body's inability to give birth, but are often caused by medical interventions introduced one after another, during the hospital birth. Hence, in the US, we have approximately 22% c-section rate, which means that approximately 1 in 4 women are not able to give birth normally. This is a rate which is at least 2 times too high.

It is clear that for the most part, it is the hospital which causes the unnecessary complication of what is supposedly to be a low risk labor. This is achieved by interfering with the course of natural labor every step of the way.

For instance, during hospital birth, if a woman's laboring time deviates from that advocated by textbooks, she is going to be induced. The artificially-induced contractions are often hard for moms to manage and notoriously hurt much more than natural contractions do. This can lead to administration of pain medication or epidural which carries another side effects and interferes further with the pushing stage. As a result of this cascade of interventions, at the end, mom needs to be help to deliver the baby by using forceps/vacuum or even a c-section.

Sure, that medical technology can be a life saver for true emergency situations. And I wholeheartedly encourage high-risk women to have a hospital birth. But, the majority of women are not in this category.

You may have heard the phrase in the law field saying that everybody is not a suspect until proven guilty. Unfortunately, hospitals do not adopt this principle when it comes to treating its pregnant clients. Rather than treating women as normal unless proven abnormal, hospitals tend to suspect women to be abnormal. It is therefore not surprising that with this kind of birthing philosophy, birth becomes a more and more of a medical event rather than a normal family event .

Aside from this kind of obvious interventions, there are other routines along with the 'dos and don'ts' within the hospital policies which can potentially cause complication. The routine use of fetal monitoring machine during hospital birth, for instance, may seem harmless. But it also causes the moms to lie still for hours in a position (usually laying on the back) which makes her feel more painful and potentially endanger the oxygen delivery from the cord to the baby. To make things worse, the readout from this machine is inconclusive and may alert the health care provider unnecessarily. Indeed, it has been shown that the use with this machine is associated with the increase of c-sections, without providing an increase in outcome, compared to the use of traditional doppler method to monitor the baby's heartbeat.

Interestingly, a lot of hospital policies regarding birth and delivery are not made to make women having a joyful and easier birth. Rather, they are designed for the sake of efficiency. As an institution, hospitals are more interested in managing the patients, rather than accomodating every client's whim. The welfare and feeling of the mother are often taken out of the equation in the policy-making process. As long as the mom and baby are alive at the end of the process, it doesn't matter whether moms are suffering unnecessarily.

Unfortunately, many women think it's normal to suffer greatly during childbirth . It is also quite common that they continue to believe that their bodies are abnormal and cannot withstand the test of childbirth. And therefore, feeling forever grateful that the hospital, together with the OB have saved them from the childbirth disaster. Little that they know that the source of disaster can be from the hospital intervention, not because of their bodies.

Hospital Is Not A Good Place For Normal Newborns

Finally, hospitals may not also be a great place to greet your newborn into the world. Aside from the fact that a hospital is a place full of germs, a lot of hospitals also do not treat the newborn respectfully or as kind as you want it to be. For instance, there could be nurses who will scrub babies too hard during the bath time, or there might not be much consolation offered by the nurse to the baby while its heel poked for the PKU test. In addition, there is usually separation between mother and baby after birth. And secondly, unless you're booked into a hospital with rooming-in facilities, you'll not be with your newborn during your stay at the hospital. A lot of newborns become distressed as a result of persistent early separation.

To Sum Up - The Truth Of Hospital Birth

In short, if you are planning to have a natural childbirth at hospital, consider the following facts that I've elaborated above, plus other things as follows:

• hospitals are rampant with medical intervention which can increase the risk of complication. As a result, you are at higher risk of having an unnecessary cesarian section if you choose a hospital birth.
• you are not in control of your birthing way. Instead, hospitals control the birth all the way.
• hospitals are full of routine and protocols which are designed to manage birth and for the sake of efficient operation, rather than to fulfill the mother's wishes.
• if you give birth at hospital, routine separation of the mother and baby is almost unavoidable.
• birth is viewed as a medical, not a normal event. The health care providers at the hospital are trained in pathology of birth, not normal birth.
• hospital environment may be impersonal and less cozy.
• it's almost impossible to have an intimate birth at a hospital with members of families present. You also will not be able to snuggle with your baby, other children and husband in bed while enjoying the new baby after the birth.

Hospital Birth - YES or NO

After pondering on above facts, I hope you can now make your own decision on where you want to have your natural birth.

You have to realize that if you choose hospital birth, you have to be ready with all the consequences. In short, if you buy a hospital birth package, you have to be ready for the ride. A lot of time, requesting or rejecting certain procedures can cause irritation and misunderstanding between patient and the hospital staff. This friction, may create a hostile or awkward environment which can make you feel uncomfortable and hard to relax.

Is this the environment you would like to be for your labor and birth ?

I, personally, am too scared to have a hospital birth. I think I won't have enough strength to reject certain hospital procedures while coping with the labor demands. I feel that my energy is better used for childbirth rather than for arguing to get what I want, and that's why I chose homebirth.

If you really want to have a peaceful and joyful natural birth, try a homebirth or birth at a birthing center where you won't have to fight, instead of a hospital birth. Fighting all the way through labor in hospital, in my opinion, is too draining physically and mentally.

In short, don't try to buy Chinese food in an Indian restaurant. Similarly, don't hope a homebirth-like situation in a hospital. If you want a homey-like and intimate environment for birth where you have your control, do it at home or at a birthing center. Don't do it at a hospital.

However, if you only care about having a natural childbirth, but it's not important for you to have a homey-like and intimate environment, then it is possible to have a natural childbirth at a hospital. It is definitely more difficult to achieve and you may have to compromise, but it is possible.

If you are interested in trying to have a hospital birth, check these following articles to maximize your chance of having a natural childbirth:

• Tips for maximizing the chance of having natural childbirth at the hospital and What to do on D-day to ensure you are having a natural child birth at hospital.
  
  
• How to choose an obstetrician supportive of natural birth
  
  
• Tips of choosing hospital supportive of unmedicated birth and Tips of choosing hospital supportive of natural vaginal birth and breastfeeding

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