Should c/s rates be published? Naming & shaming...

[maz]

So i feel that if you feel that you are not being informed or feel that you are being pressured into a c-section....find another dr!!!

easier said then done in the public sector of hospitals as you get what your given and not everyone has the money to go private.

And such a comment yet again emthasises the need to find out the statistics so you can PICK your own hospital!

[fionak]

I ended up having an emergency caesar a few months ago at one of Melbourne's private hospitals. In our pre-natal classes, the nurse running the sessions went through all the hospital statistics in detail. VBAC vs Emergency Caeasar vs Elective Caesar. They also broke down the number of births that were forceps or vaccum delivery which we all found really interesting. I don't really understand why other hospitals are so secretive about this information. I feel that when parents are selecting hospitals, they should be able to have access to this information. Having said this though, I don't agree with the notion of "naming and shaming". As many people on this thread have said, we have no way of knowing the particular circumstances surrounding each birth.

[sareeb]

does it really matter. if you want a home birth you're gonna try a home birth if you want a drug free hospital birth go for it if you want an elective ceaser thats your choice who cares how a baby is delivered as long as mum & bub come out ok. i think to much pressure is put on women and thy're made to feel a failure if they didn't have a natural drug free birth for eg. a woman at my work had an emergency c after 24hr labour and one of our co workers said "well ive had 4 kids and never had a c or an epidural i can't understand why anyone should have to it's the easy way out". as i said earlier who cares how they are born as long as they are healthy.

[paradise lost]

does it really matter. if you want a home birth you're gonna try a home birth if you want a drug free hospital birth go for it

But it's more likely you'll GET a homebirth if you stay at home, does it not follow that you're more likely to get a drug free vaginal birth if you go to a place where they are commonplace? How likely is a woman to get a drug free vaginal birth in a hospital where over 90% of women who go there have an epidural? And if you DID want a vaginal drug free birth, given the choice would you go to a hosital where 55% of women achieve that, or one where less than 10% do?

Bx

[sushee]

I can't understand why time after time women are coming into this thread and saying that by asking hospitals to be accountable for the amount of c/s they do above and beyond what is acceptable is somehow an attack on their choices?

If you had a c/s out of choice, great for you, no one is attacking your right to choose. If you had an emergency c/s, well it really wasn't a choice, was it?

The TRUTH is, many women is coerced into a c/s they wouldn't normally need. We see it here on BB ALL THE TIME. Your baby is too big. You'll put your baby in danger if you have a VBAC. Your pelvis is too small. You're too overdue. You're high risk. There are too many stories where mothers are made to feel like they're putting themselves and their babies at risk by not listening to what their doctors say. Please don't pretend it's not true, because we all know that it is. Yet if you scratch the surface on the majority of these cases, none of those reasons are valid!

I had a Dr who said he was low intervention, and even he suggested at 39w that I should have a c/s, simply because I was complaining I was over it all. If I were a new mum, who had never given birth vaginally before, imagine how good that would have sounded?

And let's not ignore the fact that in my antenatal class, 8 out of 10 women were planning a c/s, variously because they believed it would be 'safer' for their babies, or they'd been told their babies were too big, or they were told that a c/s would be less painful. Why is it that that sort of information is perpetuated day after day after day, yet we as women think it's okay for us not to be informed about it?

My sister gave birth to 2 children vaginally in Singapore, then was told by her Australian ob that her pelvis was too small to deliver her 3rd baby. So she had a c/s ('elective' it said on her forms) and guess what? Her baby was not so big after all that she couldn't have delivered her naturally. My sister is hugely upset that she was scared into making a decision that was incorrect in the end. Again her story is NOT isolated. Women here on BB get it all the time, too. So imagine how many women are being told fibs like that out there.

If you don't care about whether your hospital performs far more c/s then necessary, I think it's your prepogative to ignore any stats they're asked to divulge. If, however, you WOULD like to know how your hospital compares to other hospitals, I think you should have a right to know. I would want to know, so why shouldn't I have access to that sort of information?

[BellyBelly]

I don't think many are reading anyone else's posts or responses Sush... everyone is coming in with their experiences and thats it.

[ranger 2]

But why did your labour end in c/s? Was there intervention that some women would prefer not to have? That's the thing women need to be able to make these decisions and they should be informed of what is the norm at their chosen hospital/obs.

Hi Tanya,
I had been pushing for a couple of hours and Johanna was going into distress and I was tired. The medical intervention was required in my case.

Jodi

[maz]

I don't think many are reading anyone else's posts or responses Sush... everyone is coming in with their experiences and thats it.

here here ....many people arent thinking outside the box....

[paradise lost]

From some of the responses i don't even think people are reading the FIRST post!

Jodi, i have more questions (which you absolutely needn't answer if you don't wish to):
Was your labour artificially augmented (drip or gels or AROM)?
What position did you push in?
What, if any, pain relief did you use?

Bx

[Kitt3n]

If you don't care about whether your hospital performs far more c/s then necessary, I think it's your prepogative to ignore any stats they're asked to divulge. If, however, you WOULD like to know how your hospital compares to other hospitals, I think you should have a right to know. I would want to know, so why shouldn't I have access to that sort of information?

SNAP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Rouge]

Absolute RIPPER of a post Sush! I agree wholeheartedly.

Information should be made available. Simple as that. Its up to a woman to choose. But just because one half of the population believes their c/s is valid doesn't mean that the other half shouldn't be entitled to that information. I don't necessarily believe that every ob or every hospital is pro c/s but I think that there are plenty of situations where women haven't been informed enough. And try and remember just because you had a good experience doesn't mean everyone will, shouldn't others be allowed to make the decision for themselves and not just because a few people are happy with the current climate.

[Squizbean]

I vote no to naming & shaming the hospitals, but yes to naming & shaming the dr's. They are the ones who decide to give c-sections. I agree with FionaJill about finding out why the c-sections were done before naming & shaming as some c-sections are a necessity (I have had 2 c-sections because I can not give birth naturally). But definately name & shame dr's who do it because it's convenient!!

[ranger 2]

From some of the responses i don't even think people are reading the FIRST post!

Jodi, i have more questions (which you absolutely needn't answer if you don't wish to):
Was your labour artificially augmented (drip or gels or AROM)?
What position did you push in?
What, if any, pain relief did you use?

Bx

No I laboured naturally. The position I was pushing in was laying on my back. I didn't have any pain relief until the epidural. They were going to try a forceps delivery but on the way to the operating room Johanna backed up and went breech after being on the verge of crowning . The staff said that this was the first time a baby had actually done what she had done.

Jodi

[paradise lost]

Thanks for that Jodi! I know a mw who has a pic of a little boy who has the internal monitor clip screwed firmly into his buttock - he was born head down, so did the reverse move to your DD during labour!

Bx

[Denaya]

I voted yes to naming the hospitals. I take exception with it being called naming and shaming, a c-section is not a shameful thing, and this phrase insinuates this IMO.

I think that a c/s rate is a piece of information that we should be able to know when making a decision on which hospital to birth in - although in reality most times it's geography which dictates this anyway. We do tours of the hospital to see their bed setup on ward, look at the facilities and ask about the menu. If we are very proactive we ask about their induction policies, synto policy, cord cutting policy, work out how far we can push the packet until we have to start digging our heels in.

Why should the c/s rate be off limits to us? Personally I would prefer to birth in a hospital with a 20% c/s rate than one with a 70% rate. I know this doesn't mean my situation won't end up in a c/s, but it gives a good indiction TO ME about the general attitude of the maternity policies.

I would also prefer to try to avoid being in the unlucky 20% than try to shoot to be in the 'lucky' 30% - just makes statistical sense to me.


Regardless of your reasons for not wanting to know personally, the question strikes me of why would you want to hide it? Why keep it unknown? I can not see a benefit of keeping it secret.

[maz]

The TRUTH is, many women is coerced into a c/s they wouldn't normally need. We see it here on BB ALL THE TIME. Your baby is too big. You'll put your baby in danger if you have a VBAC. Your pelvis is too small. You're too overdue. You're high risk.

i was one of these woman....I so regret listen to the doctor at the time and taking his word for gold....his words were

its hospital's policy

still echo in my head.

And as a result of his actions I had NO CHOICE but to deliver my last 2 children via c/s also. If I had known about the 'hospitals statistics' I would have made sure I went to the other town's more natural birth friendly..and LOW rate of c/s deliveries in the first place

[scooby]

I definately think these figures should be available to women but shaming come on!!!
I really think as a country we need to start taking some responsibility for ourselves it becomes way to easy to play the blame game eg Mcdonalds is causing obesity! We are an educated race of people, we need to go into our births as we would any major event in our lives, well informed and aware of all the outcomes. The only person i blame for my 1st birth is myself i went in and handed my body over to the hospital, if i'd done my homework i would have known better.
I cant help to notice also that all the women on here who have had CS feel they have to "explain" WHY they had a CS (which i am finding myself at the moment with the looming posibility of an elective CS) i think articles like "naming and shaming" cant help but to make women feel like they have to explain why they arent birthing naturally.
I think the days of CS being conceived as a wonderful, painless, easy way "out" were well in truly but to bed in the 80's, that is not the perception of anyone i know.

[sushee]

I think if hospitals only did medically necessary c/s, their stats would reflect that, and there would be no need for any explanation about why those c/s were actually done. If their stats show they're doing c/s 40% over and above the average percentage of c/s considered medcially necessary, I think you may deduce that the most of the rest probably WEREN'T medically necessary.

ETA I actually think people are getting too hung up on the word 'shaming'. It's about making hospitals more accountable. And btw, I do think the myth that a c/s is a more painless way of having your baby is alive and well, it's just that fewer women would admit to it. But out there in the wide world, it still exists. Just in my antenatal class and my aquanatal classes, I found women who still believed it.