Natural Childbirth Example Sample

The   term  natural  childbirth refers  to  a  group  of approaches to managing childbirth that share the common aim of facilitating childbirth without medical intervention. A variety of techniques may be used to achieve this aim. Although there have been, and there still are, wide variations in cultural practices surrounding childbirth, the dominant trend in Western industrialized societies has been to medicalize birth. This means that birth has become increasingly attended and managed by medical professionals in  medical settings such as hospitals. Natural  childbirth  approaches stand in contrast to  the medicalization of childbirth,  and  indeed developed in response to it. From early in the twentieth century there was concern amongst obstetricians that Western civilization  had  impeded  women’s  ability to  labor  with  the brevity and  ease of  their  less “civilized” sisters.Natural Childbirth Example Sample One response was to treat childbirth as a risky, pathological process requiring medical intervention and management: in particular, to anesthetize the birthing woman and to use episiotomy and operative delivery such as with forceps. Hence  the  popularity in  the  United  States from 1914, when the New England Twilight Sleep Association was formed, into the 1940s of administering scopolamine and morphine to induce “twilight sleep,” which meant that women were barely conscious through their deliveries, and had no memory of the event. Proponents of natural  childbirth  took  the  opposite  view, arguing  that obstetrics was becoming too mechanistic, indeed “veterinary,” and  that  its  orientation  needed  to  broaden  to include  psychological, social, and  spiritual  aspects of childbirth as well as the biomechanical. One  means of achieving this was to involve women in antenatal physiotherapy and exercises to prepare for childbirth. The most influential  response, however, came from  Dr.  Grantly Dick-Read in his 1933 analysis of labor pain, Natural Childbirth. In  it  he  argued that  fear of childbirth  in Western society had produced physiological responses in birthing  women that  prolong labor and make it more painful. He developed an approach to foster the active involvement  and  conscious cooperation  of  birthing women that empowers them and makes them less fearful of birthing. The potential advantages of minimizing medical intervention and maximizing women’s control over their bodies in natural childbirth included shorter labor, less pain, a more satisfying birth experience, and a more alert (and hence healthier) baby because of lack of exposure to morphine and other drugs in utero. As a result of both mother and baby being conscious and alert at delivery, affective bonds between mother and child could also develop immediately and naturally from the moment of birth. Opponents of natural childbirth cite the risks associated with  birthing,  including maternal and  neonatal mortality, as justification for using medical interventions preventatively or  in  immediate  response to  potential problems.Natural Childbirth Example Sample

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A number of different techniques for natural childbirth have evolved in Europe, the United States, and elsewhere. They  are associated with  practitioners  such as Fernand Lamaze, Frederick Leboyer, Michel Odent,  and Frances Vaughan, who stress different aspects of childbirth such as the setting (e.g., quiet, dark, water births) or positions that facilitate natural childbirth (e.g., squatting). In the  United  States, Robert A. Natural Childbirth Example Sample Bradley developed DickRead’s  approach  and  expanded it  from  the  1960s  to include fathers in the antenatal preparation and the coaching of their partners through childbirth (the “Bradley method”). In more recent years this has been further expanded to include other support persons for the birthing  woman;  these may include  friends or  family members, or a paid “doula.” In most Western societies birth attendants must be licensed to practice and generally include only doctors and midwives. The practice of most midwifery, particularly for autonomous or independent midwives, is premised on the understanding of birth as a normal,  holistic,  physiological, emotional,  and  social process, and hence encourages natural childbirth approaches. Many women’s and consumer groups are also supportive of natural childbirth approaches.Natural Childbirth Example Sample