Pressure to Have the "Perfect Birth"

[Tobily]

I have one friend who is an Ob. She's a great patient-centred doctor and if i was having a preemie, twins or some other more risky situation i would consider her care. She works about 60 hours a week, much of that in theatre. She has endless paperwork to do on top of pre-natal appointments, consultations with midwives on medium-risk patients, surgery, inductions and ward rounds. You might wonder then when she finds the time to read current medical studies to keep up to date on the newest figures, risks and findings... SHE DOESN'T. She has actually laughed at me before and said "You know more than me!" about Foley inductions because her hospital only uses medication for cervical ripening...

Bx

And this is where alot of the temptation for inductions and caesareans comes into play with OB's as well. They don't have the time anymore for the unexpected, and they don't have the energy to be out of bed all night at a birth - and front up to their office for consults in the morning.

I'm not a fan of OB's but working with birthing women myself - going out at all hours, not knowing when I'll be home, not knowing when the phone is going to ring - I do understand where this need to schedule things and put some predictability into what is essentially the most unpredictable event there is, comes from. I only work with a couple of women at a time, doing a couple of births a month and sometimes it turns my life upside down for days at a time. I just had a birth last week where I was back and forth between the mother's home, the hospital and my house around the clock for 4 days. I can't imagine how it must be for them, working in the office all day and being on call for dozens of women at any one time.

BUT that is no excuse for the situation we find ourselves in now - too many caesareans, too many inductions and too much intervention in general. If obstetricians only had to deal with the small number of women who need their skills - they could manage the load better, balance their lives better and women and babies would be better off to boot.