Come on women and men of Australia - we REALLY need you right now...

Hey all,

It's so so so important that as many of you as possible write submissions to the government for the Maternity Review. We need to let them know what we want, that we want choice, no matter if it's a minority choice... at the end of the day choice is choice.

The full details of the review are here. The official review website is here.

Please use this thread to share your submissions and get help/advice/suggestions in writing your own. It doesnt need to be formal and professional - we just need the numbers sharing their experiences.

Come on ladies, lets do this - you can email in your submissions, its so easy!!!

LETS STAND TOGETHER AND DEMAND CHANGE... TOGETHER WE WILL MAKE A DIFFERENCE!!!!!

:cheer::bluecheer:

Get those keyboards burning hot - invest even 15 minutes into writing something to change the culture of birth in Australia which is spiralling out of control.

Yep, will do tonight, just marking the page so I remember!

ditto as lulu... Not going to be able to concentrate atm with ava-jayde playing her favourite game of 'lets throw our toys on the floor and make mummy pick them up cause its funny"

Working on mine at the moment, will post it here when I'm done.

C'mon ladies we spend so much time and energy here posting about the problems, all it takes is the same amount of time and energy directed to making a submission so that we can tell the people who have the will and the power to make some changes.

We haven't had a chance like this for a long time - the health minister is actually listening.

Marking too and will be back later tonight. Mine might be a tad long! ;) Tobily would love to see what others come up with! :)

Here is mine. I did it last night.

Submission for the Maternal Health Services Review.

I write this to you as a mother of 4 children who had to travel 80 kilometres just to give birth to them.

This review is long overdue and my hope is that it makes serious inroads into the state of maternal health care in this country.

When my husband and I found out that we were expecting our first child, due to be born in early 2001, we were hoping that we would be able to birth him in our brand new local hospital, which was completed in the previous year. It was a state-of-the-art facility, complete with Maternity ward and we were excited to think that our child could be born there. Although we knew that in the ?old? hospital that the Maternity unit had been downgraded to only accept those women considered ?low risk? ? women who had no previous complications during birth and those who were multiparas (women on subsequent pregnancies), we hoped that with this new hospital it would bring a new opportunity for those women previously excluded to be able to birth there.

But we were to find out that the status quo would continue at the new hospital. This meant that I was excluded from our local hospital and that I would now have to travel a 160 kilometre round trip to the next town to see a Doctor I had never met before, in a town I didn?t frequent and give birth in a hospital far away from family. There was the vague hope that after I gave birth I would be able to travel back to my local hospital for my post-partum hospital stay, but within 6 months of my falling pregnant, even this option was taken away from me.

And even then there was no guarantee that I would give birth in this hospital. It was only a small District Hospital and could only take women after 38 weeks of gestation, women with singleton pregnancies, women with no health complications for themselves or their babies. If you were in any way considered to be ?high risk? then you were forced to travel to the NEXT hospital, which was a further 80 kilometres away.

Overall I cannot complain about my births, I had the best Doctor?s and the best Midwives, I had vaginal births and I had perfect and healthy babies and although I had some complications after one of my births, I was attended to in an extremely professional manner and quickly received the treatment I needed. But not all women are as fortunate as I and suffer terrible birth traumas that can take many years for them to fully digest and recover from.

The situation has only become more dire as the years have gone on. Not one single pregnant woman I talk to doesn?t have concerns that she will not make it to the hospital in time and fears either giving birth at home unattended or by the roadside. This raises another, separate issue, in that the husbands and partners of these labouring women are under even more pressure to get them to the hospital ?on time?.

It makes me wonder if women and their babies will have to start dying before anything is ever done about this situation. I accept that sometimes it is a staffing issue ? there just isn?t enough Doctors or Midwives in an area to run rosters. But most disgraceful of all is that often it is just Bureaucratic red tape or bungling that sees fully functioning Maternity wards either downgraded or closed.

Rural women have a right to the same quality of Maternal health care as our city sisters. We want more choices, we want access to Independent Midwives for homebirths, we want fully functioning hospital Maternity wards, and we want Birth Centres. Our choices are severely limited before we even start.

Not only do we have severely limited choices for our preferred mode of care, which currently stands at Public or Private Hospital only, we are also at the mercy of the care we have. Women who have had surgical births have no option to have a future vaginal birth (or VBAC ? Vaginal Birth After Caesarean) because none of the current care providers are willing to take it on or encourage it because it?s just too hard for them. Obstetrician?s would rather talk a woman into having another surgical birth than let her have a vaginal birth ? a birth which would see her leave hospital for home sooner, as opposed to a surgical birth which would see her in hospital for a longer stay, which then takes beds away from other women, not to mention taking up valuable theatre time which could be better used towards shortening the surgical waiting lists.

We need to move away from the Medicalised birth industry and start treating birth as the natural and normal process that it is. Australia has a disgustingly high surgical birth rate and steps need to be made to lower it. For too long Obstetricians have ruled the roost when it comes to birth and this needs to change. Of course they have their place in birth when it is complicated and needs to be medicalised, but when birth is taking place in a normal, healthy woman with a healthy baby, then there is no need for them.

Sadly though the AMA, and namely Obstetricians specifically, are at loggerheads with the natural birth movement and shun the idea that Midwives are fully capable of taking over control of birthing women and this needs to change. The choice should be given to the birthing women, not to have it dictated to them by the medical fraternity.

Medicalised birth costs this country millions of dollars each year, money which could be redirected into other health areas.

Another problem that goes hand in hand with Maternity services is the post-natal care that women in rural areas receive and basically there is none. There are Maternal Child Health Nurses for the weekly check-ups of our babies, but where is the access to qualified Lactation Consultants? The Parliamentary Inquiry into Breastfeeding last year found that there were severe issues in this area that needed addressing, but it hasn?t solved the problem. The attrition rate for Breastfeeding is very high in rural areas simply because there isn?t the backup and support needed once a Mother is home with her baby. Often the advice one receives in hospital is conflicting and can leave a new Mother, who is struggling trying to establish a breastfeeding relationship with her baby with no other option but to turn to artificial feeding of her baby ? something which can have a possible long term impact of the health of the child. Very concerning is that not all midwives are certified Lactation Consultants, so that at the most crucial time for establishing breastfeeding a women can?t even access the best person to help her.

Unlike our city counterparts, we don?t have access to Lactation Consultants that can come into our home once we leave hospital and give us the direction we need if we are struggling. All we have is access to a phone help line, which is staffed by time-starved mothers themselves and speaking to someone on the phone who could be hundreds of kilometres away isn?t conducive to helping us the way that we need it the most.

We often don?t even have access to proper care and treatment for Post Natal Depression. All we get is the Edinburgh test and there isn?t enough follow up treatment or access to qualified counsellors if we need them.

Another issue is that the sheer distances required to travel to seek care for some women mean that they put off appointments for check ups, or they simply don?t go because either the cost of travel or the distance (and often both) is too prohibitive. This means that lives are possible at stake if complications arise and remain untreated.

In the weeks before the birth some remote families have no option but to relocate to be closer to where they will give birth. This means that they then have to travel the long distance back home in the post-partum period, so it is no wonder that women are being failed by the system when they bid their farewell to the hospital and face the daunting challenge of becoming a parent with no support network once they get home.

I am part of an online Conception, Pregnancy and Parenting community forum and every single day I read of the hardships that women face when having to decide on care providers and which mode of care they want for their pregnancy and birth. It breaks my heart to read of women who cannot get into the precious few Birth Centres that there are in this country due to lack of places, of women who want a homebirth but can?t because they cannot afford it, of women who blindly trust their Obstetricians are led into the most Medialised of births ? something which can ruin all future births for them, of women who aren?t educated enough about the choices they do have, and about women heartbroken because they couldn?t establish breastfeeding.


What I would like to see changed in our Maternal health care system is;

• Fully funded Independent Midwives to allow women to choose homebirth ? something which should be encouraged as a valid option as it lessens the burden on Hospitals ? both in regards to bed shortages which is pandemic in almost all hospitals and also freeing up time-starved medical staff.
• Women given a choice of care models, whether it be Independent Midwife led care, Midwife led care in a hospital or birth centre setting or the medicalised mode of care led by Obstetricians.
• More places for direct entry Midwifery at Universities. This will put more Midwives into the workforce quicker than it previously does with the current limited placements for direct entry B.Mid, meaning that those who miss out have to take the ?long road? and do their Bachelor of Nursing first.
• Re-open closed Maternity wards as Midwife led care Birth Centres for the smaller townships. This way low risk mothers will get to give birth locally.
• Include Lactation Consultancy as part of the B.Mid. Currently as it stands this is an ?optional extra? and what is included as part of the degree isn?t comprehensive enough. Only those that wish to pursue it further do so. It should be mandatory for Midwives to also be qualified Lactation Consultants so that new mothers get the help they deserve at the time they need it the most.
• Access to Post Natal Depression counselling and help for those that need more intensive treatment.

We?re not asking for much and it may be too late for me, as my childbearing days are finished, but I want this for those that are to come after me, and for my Daughters. I shudder at the thought of what the Maternal health system could be like when they are giving birth to my Grandchildren.

I thank you for allowing me the opportunity to have my say on a subject that is very close to my heart.

And this is the related article I posted about the Review earlier today https://www.bellybelly.com.au/forums...-our-help.html

OMG! I have a local hospital, but had to travel 2 hours to have DS - passing 2 other hospitals on the way that you can't birth in! I mean NOONE! No matter how many babies you've had, well unless you are going to give birth in 5 minutes. As well as travelling the 2 hours just for ante natal care every week towards the end.
I'll bbl to have a better read!

Here's mine.

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I make my submission as a consumer of maternity services in NSW, as a health care professional, as a husband, and as a father.
I have two beautiful daughters, both of whom have been born at home. On both of these occasions, we took responsibility for the arrangement of a privately employed midwife, and paid for her services.
It continues to astound me, as both a health professional and as a parent, that such services are not provided as part of the public health system. Research from around the world into the use of independently practicing midwives to manage pregnancy care, birth, and postnatal care in the home setting has consistently confirmed two outcomes – that home birth is as safe as hospital birth or safer for women who are appropriately screened, and that the rate of intervention is much lower. Other similar research has indicated that for women who have pregnancy care and give birth in the home setting, rates of satisfaction are higher than for similar women who have their pregnancy care and give birth in a hospital setting.
While I understand that the provision of maternity services is a politically fraught area, and I have read the Australia and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists statement concerning their refusal to endorse home birth as a "safe" option, even this organisation cannot deny the wide-ranging body of research that demonstrates the benefits of this model. Indeed, such a model of midwifery-led maternity services has been successfully implemented in New Zealand, where caesarean section rates are now much lower than our own country.
Consider also the cost of providing midwife-led and homebirth services, as opposed to allowing obstetric- and hospital-based management of maternity care for all women, irrespective of their risk factors. Independently practicing midwives currently charge between $3,000 and $4,000 for their services; this fee includes all prenatal, birth, and postnatal care and the provision of all necessary equipment. While I do not currently have access to accurate financial statistics pertaining to the cost of maternity services in the hospital setting, consider that a hospital stay, including interventions such as forceps extraction, continuous fetal monitoring, or a caesarean section, costs considerably more than the cost of a homebirth. Also consider that the number of women who require a caesarean section in the hospital system is around 30%; the number of women who require a caesarean section during an attempt to birth at home is around 2%. While some of this disparity can be explained by the more stringent screening procedures that apply to women who home birth, it is clear that even if the government were to fund or partially fund independently practicing midwives under Medicare, or alternatively introduce such services as part of the public maternity system, the result would be significant cost savings.
Home birth and midwife-led care for appropriately screened clients is safer, more satisfying for clients, and less expensive than obstetric- and hospital-managed birth. It is a disgraceful mark on our health care system that this form of care remains so inaccessible to the majority of women, in particular low-risk women living in rural areas who under the current system are often required to leave their homes and travel hundreds of kilometres only to be placed under obstetric (high risk) management. This situation needs to be addressed.

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As a mother of three I am concerned about our health system & maternity care.

When I had my first daughter I lived 10 minutes away from a hospital with a maternity ward, but as I was only 18 and it was my first child I could not have my baby there and had to make the forty minute drive to a bigger hospital.
I also did the same with my second daughter.

When I had my son we lived in a different area. I was living 5 minutes from the closest hospital, 40 minutes from the next one, then had a third one hour away. Not one of these three hospitals had a functioning maternity ward. Instead I had to travel two hours to my nearest maternity ward.

I also had to travel those two hours to visit my ante natal clinic as it was the closest to me. This meant that by the end of my pregnancy I had to keep my oldest child out of school for one day a fortnight, then one day a week.

Then when I was close to having my son I went to stay with my mother and father in law so I could get to the hospital in time. This meant another two weeks my daughter couldn't attend school and two weeks I had to be away from my husband as he had to stay for work.

Then when I went into labour my husband had to travel the two hours to get to me before his son was born. We are lucky that my labour was 5 hours. He made it with just over an hour to go before I had our baby.
But this meant I was alone til he got there.

I think the situation should be reevaluated. Maternity services are dropping off where they are needed. The town I live in has a high rate of teen pregnancy, yet these teens are supposed to be able to find their way to the bigger hospital to have their needs met when there is a very slim chance that they or their partners have a license or car.

When I was pregnant with my second daughter I chose to only see my general practitioner and went into labour without having seen an obstetrician once. My labour was attended by a midwife only and it was the most relaxed and natural labour I have had.

I think it is about time everyone realises that we are women. We have been giving birth for thousands of years. Why can't those of lower risk give birth in their home towns where they are close to family and friends when they will need them the most?

I would rather have just me, my husband and a midwife at a small hospital, than just my husband and I on the side of the road trying to make the two hour drive.

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Can you guys read over this for me & let me know what you think first? My baby brain isn't quite sure how it sounds! :)

I think that's fine Skye, well done.

I don't know what to say in mine.

Trillian, Michael and Skye.... :clap::clap:

Neenee - what they're looking to hear about from mums are your personal experiences of birthing in the current system. Whether you found the system met your needs in terms of choices for care, and whether your expectations were met with care you did receive. If not, what would you have liked to see improved?

For example for mine, I will talk about how the only options given to me when I was pregnant with my first child were public or private hospital care. I had no idea about independent midwives or the safety of homebirth...in fact I didn't even know Australian women could have homebirths. I experienced a highly intervened labour involving a number of practices which are not supported by evidence, for example breaking my waters, intravenous antibiotics without presence of an infection or reason to think I would develop one, syntocinon under circumstances where it wasn't yet necessary. I'll probably mention the early breastfeeding difficulties we experienced and the (total) lack of assistance despite the fact that I live in the middle of a major capital city. I'll also talk a little about some of the "stand out" experiences I've had in hospitals supporting other mothers.

Finally, you can make some suggestions for improvements.
The big things are:

1. Provider numbers for Independent midwives. This will enable mothers to claim for their services through medicare.
2. Addressing the lack of indemnity insurance for IM's. This lack of professional insurance is a guarantee that a good proportion of qualified middies are "scared off" independent practice because it is too risky for them personally to not be insured.
3. Rural access to maternity services - the closure of maternity wards in rural areas seeing low risk, healthy women travel ridiculous distances to birth.
4. Addressing the issues in the way our system is structured that sees a high proportion of low risk women under the care of obstetricians - who are proven to intervene in their pregnancies and labours more often than midwives, with no improvement in outcomes. Intervention can be life saving when it's needed, when done "just in case" it increases risks for mother and baby.
5. Support for breastfeeding - wider access to subsidised lactation consultants and implementation of the other recommendations that came out of the previous governments breastfeeding inquiry.

OK off you go :):lol:

done, sent, and the links forwarded to my local doula and other mums :)


Dear Ms Bryant,

As a woman in her forties trying to have another child in a small town, I have been distressed and disappointed with the lack of services available to pregnant women in the Coffs Harbour area. In February of this year, a routine ultrasound at 9.5 weeks gestation revealed that my baby’s heartbeat and growth had stopped at around the 7.5 week mark. I was advised by my GP to go to Emergency at Coffs Harbour Health Campus for a D&C. My fianc? and I waited fourteen hours, grieving and in pain, to be examined by a doctor. When I was finally taken up for the surgery there was a mistake in the admissions process, I was never given pre-op meds, and the surgeon I had spoken to beforehand wasn’t the one who actually did the D&C.

I was sent home with no post-op instructions, no painkillers, and no antibiotics, with no appointment for a follow-op checkup either. Later that week I was back in emergency with retained products of conception and waited another 12 hours to be examined. I was never offered grief and loss counselling, never seen by a social worker, and not even referred for genetic counselling . The stress of being left to miscarry on my own in the waiting room has contributed greatly to the grief and loss I have suffered. The Coffs Harbour Pregnancy Care Service is brand new – I had children in Coffs Harbour in 1988 and 1992 and there was no ante-natal clinic there at that time, one of the factors that led me to have a home-birth with my youngest, as I received more care from the homebirth midwife than I had had from my OB with the twins in 1988. Another was the distance to a birthing unit – we lived 30km out of Coffs Harbour at the time.

I believe the Pregnancy Care Service is vital to the wellbeing and safety of the women of Coffs Harbour. I have struggled through three miscarriages so far this year to receive continuity of care, in a town where there are very few OB’s and at $180.00 per visit plus a six-week waiting list, are out of the price reach of most families in this low-income area. I am still trying to access specific grief and loss counselling, and follow-up care for complications arising from miscarriage and an ageing reproductive system. Lack of access to care is a primary reason why some women are choosing to not have children and particularly those of us in the older, high-risk category.

The bottom line is, if women cannot access suitable support services, they are being put at risk in their pregnancies.


Thank you for your time.

Dragonfly - I had both my girls at CHHC. I lived in Nambucca Heads at the time, but couldn't go to Macksville.
I don't know about your experiences with the Coffs Obs, but I had the 3 that were around at the time & wasn't impressed with any of them.
But in saying that I had a much better experience there than in Dubbo - 2 hours away from where I am now.
In 2001/2 & 2004/5 I was never advised of any ante natal clinic in Coffs either. An Ob was the only choice. Which, yeah, cost a fortune. (One of the reasons I didn't see one with DD2.)

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Dragonfly - I had both my girls at CHHC. I lived in Nambucca Heads at the time, but couldn't go to Macksville.
I don't know about your experiences with the Coffs Obs, but I had the 3 that were around at the time & wasn't impressed with any of them.
But in saying that I had a much better experience there than in Dubbo - 2 hours away from where I am now.
In 2001/2 & 2004/5 I was never advised of any ante natal clinic in Coffs either. An Ob was the only choice. Which, yeah, cost a fortune. (One of the reasons I didn't see one with DD2.)

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up until may this year there wasn't any such thing as an antenatal clinic in Coffs. when i was having the twins in 1988, there was two OB's, Garland and Ghosh, and two GP's who would attend a birth. I was passed from doctor to doctor until i moved back up here from Wollongong, and had Ghosh for the last few weeks of the pg, whereupon he went on holiday and left me int he hands of an inexperienced locum. needless to say i had a horribly intervened-upon birth that nearly resulted in the death of myself and my son!

Garland is still practicing, and still prefers to do c/s than let a mother birth. the other two OB's are much better, Harvey Ward (who also is the Sydney IVF outreach) and Marylin Clarke, who works for the Pregnancy Care Clinic (the antenatal at the hospital) as well as her private practice. both are too expensive for me.

i chose a VBAC homebirth with my youngest, with a hospital trained English midwife, and it was the best choice i could have made. having said that, it was always onthe cards that i would rupture or have complications, and 30k from hospital was a worry, but i trusted her and my body/instincts, and it went smoothly.

Garland, Goldman (Goldfinger) & Brimsmeed.

They are the three I met.

I was under DR Goldman (with the lovely nn), but ended up in labour with DR Garland for DD1. If you read my birth story he did want to take me for a ceaser coz it was taking too long!! I had DD1 myself a bit over an hour later thanks to my MIL saying no!

Goldman wanted to induce me 2 days before I was due to have DD1.

Never gave Brimsmeed a chance. I booked under him, but just saw my GP right up to the end. He came in after the birth of DD2, decided I didn't need stitches & that was it!

it's all new to me, lol, i never thought i'd have a chance to have another as my ex didn't want any more kids. they're 20 and 16 now! lucky for me, DF is ready, willing, and able :D

still, living in a country town means that now Baringa Hospital has no birthing unit, there really isn't a choice at all.

here is mine.. I hope it is ok... :dunno:

Dear Mrs Bryant,

I write to you in regards to the current system, in which women today are giving birth. It has come to my attention, that I like many other women in this country, are unhappy with the level of care and the experiences they have undergone, in said system.

I had my first child coming up to 6 months ago, and at the time had minimal knowledge of what I was about to encounter or even what to expect. During my pregnancy I had heard a lot of different stories from different women and the treatment that they were receiving during their 9 months. It suddenly occurred to me that I was not receiving treatment that other women were that was seen as ?routine?. During my whole pregnancy, I had 1 appointment at the hospital, due to continual blunders with appointments.

When time came for me to actually give birth, there were still many things not explained to me. I was told due to meconium in my fluid that I was to be induced. I was extremely nervous about this prospect as this was also something that had no been explained to me. Once seeing my anxiety about the issue, instead of having the procedure properly explained to me I was made to feel ?silly? about being nervous as it was ?just a needle?. Now after giving birth and reading lots of different reports on the drug used I have come to realise that it wasn?t ?just a needle? and should have been taken more seriously and clarified to both myself and my partner. I was also not told until I was in labour that my blood group was A negative, and then had the dangers of what it meant if my daughter had of been a positive, explained to me and my partner. Quite distressing to be honest hearing about this considering the traumatic experience I was already having.

During my labour, I was not given the choice to be active and walk around, I was barely allowed to have a shower, even though I had previously broke my water and needed to shower desperately. As a result of practically being bed ridden, I was forced into an Emergency Caesarean . I feel if I had of had the opportunity to begin with an active labour I would of progressed further than 2 cm dialated and been able to give birth naturally. I honestly feel like I had that experience taken away from me, without a say from my part. That was MY birth not to mention again, my FIRST birth, in which I will never get back.

Something about the current situation needs to be done. Not only was my birthing experience traumatic but the afterwards experience was just as bad. I was given misleading information by midwifes on breastfeeding, which as a result ended my breastfeeding journey at 10 weeks, not to mention the fact that I was bullied by midwifes on a few different occasions which I had to write a report about.
Not only is Pre-natal care important, but what about the labour and birthing process as well as post-natal. Where was the support that was deserved? There needs to be more support and MORE education for the processes and procedures that are carried out within these hospitals. I feel that we are not in control of our own birthing experiences anymore, which should not be the case. We need information and education in our pre natal appointments, we need information and education in our labour and birthing experiences, we need information and education in our post natal care. But most of all, above anything we need rights and respect for the choices and decisions that we make about how we want to birth our children.

Yours Sincerely,

Kirsty Lee Forbes

Great work everyone!!! Keep them coming in, this is our one big chance!!!!

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Dear Skye,

Thank you for your submission in response to the Maternity Services Review Discussion Paper, “Improving Maternity Services in Australia: A Discussion Paper from the Australian Government”.

Your submission, along with all other submissions and information, research and expertise assembled from other sources will be used by the Department of Health and Ageing in the development of a report to the Minister for Health and Ageing, the Hon Nicola Roxon, MP.

Thank you again for your contribution to this important process.

Yours sincerely



Rosemary Bryant
Chief Nurse and Midwifery Officer
Maternity Services Review
Policy Development Branch
Primary and Ambulatory Care Division
Department of Health and Ageing

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My reply I got this morning. I'm glad coz I wasn't sure it went through.

YAY!!! Well done everyone, keep them coming it closes at the end of the month... even if you can only spare 15 minutes, thats all we need, a vote of support for change...

will write tonight...need to keep this page though so i can find it later...thanks for the link guys. terrific as usual!

The Maternity Coalition has published this information on their website if you need some background and help getting started :)

Maternity Coalition-Advocacy

This is mine, is it ok?, might need some help in the spelling department, not my strong point

Dear Mrs Bryant

I am writing in regards to the situation women are faced with when it comes to birthing their babies.

When it came to making the decision where I was to birth my second child, I thought it would be an easy one, I had health insurance so naturaly I would go to the closest private hospital.
Now please bare in mind that I was over two hours away from this hospital and the closest birthing public hospital which was Rockhampton. I could of gone to Emerald (two hrs in the other direction), but if there were any complications then I would of been shiped to Rockhampton. Our closest hospital didnt have a maternity ward so you couldnt birth there unless bub was already coming out.
So I was to go private, well that was untill I found out that if I went private I would not be able to get an epidural, the anethitist's in town had decided that none of them wanted to get out of bed to give a labouring women an epidural at two in the morning so they wouldnt give it to anyone no matter what time of day.
I wasnt realy sure if id need an epidural but I wanted that option and if I went private (something that I was going to be out of pocket $2000 if i did), then I would of had that choice taken away.

Ok, so now I was going public, it was decide that I would be induced on my due date due to the fact that I was so far from town and didnt want to run the risk of birthing my baby on the side of the road as the two women who had lived in our house had done prior to me, and the fact that we didnt have any family or friend in Rockhampton to stay with and couldnt afford to stay in a hotel for that long.
So my due date came and I was induced and five very painfull hrs later ( due to the fact that my body wasnt ready to give birth) my son was born.
I can't complain about the labur ward as it was lovely and the midwives that I had were great, but the maternity ward was something out of the stone age, it was freezing and I had 5 other people in the same room as me, 2-3 of these where sugical patients as the surgical ward had no beds left and at least one of them snored like a train everynight, so not only was I up every two hours feeding I was kept awake in between times aswell.
On the second day I was ready to go home but because my baby had very mild jaundice and I lived so far away they wanted to put him under lights, under suferance I agreed which I wish I had'nt. He was not put into a humidy crib as is normaly the case but striped and had a protable light placed over him, so here was my two day old baby with no clothes on in a freezing drafty room with nothing to keeo him warm but an ultra violet light. As the time went on his temperature droped repetadly and I would have to put him inside my clothes to warm him up, finaly at two in the morning with my baby screaming beacuse he was cold and me in tears because I was told not to take him out of the light a lovely Kiwi midwife came in and said to just pick him up and cuddle him, she said that the equipment that the hospital had was so out dated that it wasnt funny and it was riduculas to leave him like that.

So my question to you is do you think that this is ok, in a country like Australia that is so wealthy?

I would like to have a home water birth for my next child but at $4000 and with the change to the baby bonus I dont think we will be able to afford it, Can you tell me why I should miss out on this experience just because I have a morgage and household bills and dont have the extra monet to pay for it.

Why is it that in New Zealand free inderpendant midwives are availible but in Australia it is not.

I would like to see women have more free choices in where and how they birth their babies, weither they choose to do it at home or in a hospital, in water or on a bed, if they want to birth standing on their head then they should have the right to choose and have the support they need to do so with out being critisised by medical proffesionals.

Thank you for taking the time to read this letter, I do hope that when the time comes you and everyone else involved make the right decision's to benifit and provide this wonderful country's women with the services that we need, at the end of the day if we need more babys than should'nt it be right to provide a great maternity system to birth them in.

Ragards

Shayann

What is the address we have to send this to

I am a very happy 52 year old expectant grandmother. I want to take a moment to express what I know can be achieved when we use our voice to make changes happen.
I was a childbirth educator trained in Australia by A.C.E and PCA. I have spent much of my working life lobbying for various changes in birthing and post natal practices in Sydney and Nepean area.
I was the community based rep on the Ante Natal Review Committee at Nepean hospital some years ago which was created by the government in an attempt to "upgrade" hospital ante-natal classes (with varying degrees of success).
I was a NMAA (now Breastfeeding Australia) counselor for about 12 years. Our Lower Blue Mountains group (led at the time by a truly committed and focused lay-person who I shouldn't name without her permission) provided hours of counseling services to women in the post natal ward at Nepean Hospital. Our group was very heavily involved in providing education days for interested health professionals at Nepean hospital at this time. These "education days" were extremely well attended by doctors and midwives alike and helped provide an atmosphere of respect and cooperation in breastfeeding practices in the post natal wards at that time.
I was the first extra support person to attend a birth at Nepean Hospital. This was achieved through one woman who felt a strong need for extra help and support during labour. This woman spent time during her pregnancy writing letters, calling and meeting with people in order to make a case for my inclusion in her choice of birthing attendants. I had some input during this process but mostly this one woman who wanted me to attend her during her birth drove this change. What she did meant that all subsequent birthing women were allowed to have extra support people available at this hospital if they chose.
Without the call for change nothing changes . If we are silent long enough things start to slip backwards.
I had 2 of my babies at home which cost $1000 (each) at the time. Fear, inadequate and inaccurate information and increasing rates of litigation have driven up the cost of giving birth at home and, sadly, it is becoming prohibitive for many women at a time when there are such heavy financial demands on families.
My beautiful pregnant daughter brought this, her favourite forum to my attention. It is wonderful to see the passion is still alive and well. I will certainly write my thoughts to the gov on this matter, in particular the need for support and financial assistance for those women who wish to give birth at home and for the midwives and doctors who wish to attend them.
Bless you for providing a forum to help drive such changes.

This is my submission, but what is the actual email adresss I can send it to or will bellybelly forward them all.

Dear Mrs Bryant,

I am currently trying to conceive my first child and as this has been taking quite a bit of time I have spent these months researching my birth options in this country.

I am lucky enough to live in a city that has a midwife led birth centre however I beleive that availability to book in there is quite difficult due to over subscription. I do not wish to birth in a hospital if I can avoid it due to what I see as over medicalisation of birth leading to unecessary interventions. A view I feel is supported by our ceasarian rate being above the World Health Organisation recommended level. I feel there is a lack of education about the benefits of a natural birth and that there are not enough resources being provided to encourage this act. I do beleive in having the hospital system for high risk and emergencies during birth however I strongly feel that a midwife led industry is the way we should be heading.

If independant midwives were afforded medicare backing and access to affordable insurance this would lead the way for the beginning of privately run birthing centres as well as government funded birth centres where ever the industry saw a need. These would employ fully trained midwives that could perhaps have an association with an obstetric practice that would then see and treat at a hospital any patient that showed complications during their birth.

By employing midwives who are trained in natural ways to reduce pain during childbirth and who also advocate techniques to allow a more relaxed and focussed birth process the need for drugs and interventions should lessen with time and we will see a lower ceasarian rate.

Obstetricians are surgeons by trade, they operate, that's what they do. Midwives assist the birth of babies. They also play an important role in pre-natal and ante-natal care as well as being able to train as lactation consultants. If we support Midwife led services such as birth centres and also by supporting midwife assisted homebirth we free up the obstetricians to be more available in their role.

We are slowly losing the confidence in our bodies to birth our babies and if we don't look at changing that soon it will be lost for good. At the moment in Australia there does not appear to be a lot of information regarding natural birthing practises at the begining of a pregnancy journey as most doctors will refer you to an Obstetrician and the Obstetricians aren't really going to refer you to a birthing centre or midwife based care because they would be doing themselves out of a job, so essentially unless you know someone who has bucked the trend and opted for a non medicalised delivery, chances are you have little or no information as to these choices. I would like to see the Government provide a number of Midwife led birth centres and word of mouth about the experience a mother had there would change the face of how we birth our children in this country. Thank you for your time and a chance to voice my choices.

Yours Sincerely

The email address to send in your submissions is:

maternity.services.review@health.gov.au

Fantastic job ladies let's keep them coming :clap:

I am writing to express both my happiness at the positive experience birthing my first child was, but also to say how disappointing it is that I would not be supported by the Government if a chose a home birth in the future.

I had my first child at the Mercy Family Birth Centre in Heidelberg, Victoria, 15 months ago. I had a very straight forward pregnancy and a 12 hour, straight forward (but by no means easy!!) labour. I had wonderful support from my partner who is a health professional and the midwives basically left us alone to get on with the job, aside from coming in to observe how things were going and check blood pressure etc. I found the care to be exactly what we wanted at the family birth centre- the midwives were there should we need them but did not intervene or try and take over at any point. It was a wonderful experience and I found the pre and post natal care to be fantastic. We went home less than 24 hours after our daughter was born and found the home visits frequent and thorough enough so that we did not feel abandoned by the health system just because we were feeling ready to go home so soon.

I will never forget the wonderful midwife, who was there when i delivered my daughter, saying before we left for home "we won't see you two for the next baby- you can do that on your own at home!".

I would dearly love to have a home birth next time and am so mystified as to why midwives are not medicare funded. It just seems so crazy that fit and healthy women with no hint of complications are not allowed to birth at home with a midwife- instead we must endure the car ride to hospital (usually with very intense contractions as we have stayed home as long as possible), that car ride and the arrival at hospital and into a strange room almost always slows labour and totally interrupts any rhythm you had coping with the contractions and then take up a hospital bed and other resources which would be better used by someone who actually needed it.

I urge you to seriously consider giving women such as myself the choice to homebirth with a midwife- not only so I can bring my next baby into the world the way I would like to but so I can free up resources for those that need them.

Thankyou for listening to my story and suggestions.

Here's mine. How is it?

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Dear Ms Bryant, I am writing to you in response to your request for submissions to the Maternity Services Review.

I had my first baby in a public hospital. She was born by assisted delivery with vacuum extraction because i had not been given proper information on how to birth properly. I was laying flat on my back and i was not pushing correctly. The vacuum then made her shoulder get stuck on the way out.

My main care provider was shared care with my GP and the midwives at the hospital. Each visit i saw a different midwife. I had to explain myself over and over again. It felt impersonal. I felt like a number. I did not receive any information about how to deal with the birth both physically and emotionally. I went into the birth knowing hardly anything. I was not even told to read books etc.

During the pregnancy i had a lack of support and felt like i had no choices. In the end i developed pre-eclampsia. Due to this, i was induced. I knew nothing about being induced. They didn't tell me anything and i just went with it thinking they knew more about my body than i did.

During the birth i experienced a lot of negitivity. I had only the support of my husband. And due to being only 18 years old i felt i was being treated like an outcast. I was told to do 'this and 'that'. Never was i asked what 'I' wanted. I was given Pethadine when i did not even ask for it. My baby was taken away from me straight after the birth to 'give us both a rest'.

After the birth i developed PND. I did not bond with my daughter. I felt like my body had failed and i was told so. I was told my body was too small to birth my baby. I tried to breastfeed but after 2 days of no support and no one showing me what to do i was told by a midwife to just give her a bottle of formula. Thinking she knew best, i did so. To this day I regret making that descion. I believe if i had been given the right support and the right information my experience would have been much better.

My subsequent child was born vaginally without any assistance. My care provider was a team of midwives who i only saw 2 during the entirity of my pregnancy.

During the pregnancy i experienced a lot of support. I was given choices and i felt in control. Even when my labour had to be helped along with syntocinon i still felt in control the whole time. At no point was the synto or the epidural i had pushed on me. I was left to discuss it all with my husband for a couple of hours before we made our descion.

After the birth i experienced even more support. I was shown how to properly breastfeed and i bonded with my son right away.

I am now pregnant with my third child and i am having a homebirth. I have had to hire a midwife that lives 2.5 hours away from me because there is no one closer to me. We are struggling to pay for it but i will do what i can to have the birth i want and deserve.

I believe our maternity system needs to provide better support for midwives. They need to have medicare provider numbers so that more women can choose to have a homebirth without any restictions. They need better support from all of the maternity medical profession.

We also need more birth centre that are not so hard to get into and more free-standing birth centres. We need better support for women who are planning a VBAC and better promotion of VBAC as an option. Women need choices and midwives need to be able to give them those choices.

Yours sincerely,
Tegan Archer

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I just got an email acknowledgement from Rosemary Bryant :)

Hopefully it is all taken on board!