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March 25, 2005
Birth Prep Class #4
Tuesday's birth prep class dealt with technology, both the stuff that's more common to the stuff that's rarer and even the ultra rare "this will probably never happen to you" stuff, and Bonu discussed things in order of least risk, to greatest risk.
Most of this is stuff that I hopefully won't encounter, and definitely not if we have the birth the way we want it. The vast majority of it is stuff that occurs in the hospitals, some of it necessary, some of it not so much. It was nice to hear a good overview of what each thing is, does, and the risks for mother and baby, as well as the possible pros. Bonu would also give her opinion as to whether or not it was something where the benefits would outweigh the risks and cons.
The various topics ranged from IVs (as well as eating/drinking in the labour & delivery room), forceps, vacuums, induction techniques such as "sweeping" or "stripping" the membranes, various methods of fetal/labour monitoring, prostaglandins (including a mention of Cytotec, as well as a recommendation to avoid it, which I was grateful for. If you want to know why to avoid Cytotec in labour induction, I highly recommend reading this article. It's quite the eye opener, and it makes me fairly angry with the FDA), episiotomies, pain medication, epidurals, natural methods of induction, induction and augmentation of labour, caesarian sections and possibly some other stuff I forget.
Basically, a lot of this class, both Tuesday specifically as well as the entire course really, is geared to a way of thinking that PreZ and I appreciate. That intervention is generally speaking unnecessary in a normal pregnancy, and that most pregnancies will fall into the normal bracket, especially if given room to progress as they naturally would. Technology and intervention should be used judiciously, not routinely.
It's interesting to hear what are valid reasons to use certain technologies, and what are pretty crappy reasons that are easily poked through, or which are things that warrant you standing up and asking for more definitive testing or whatever before making a decision to go ahead with a procedure. Knowing also that statistically if you choose one intervention, you're more likely to have other subsequent interventions was interesting too. Kind of like the domino effect... once you have one, there's the possibility of more on the horizon, in many cases to counteract some of the side effects from the previous intervention. I guess the analogy of a slippery slope might be a more accurate one than dominos, but whichever works.
I think another good point that was brought up was the fact that the patient's bill of rights states that you can refuse any procedure you don't want, no matter what, even though you might certainly get pressured by staff to follow with their wishes (and possibly even face some animosity). I think people often feel that they can't say no to their doctors, when they can. As Bonu mentioned, they're your caregivers, you hired them, you can refuse procedures they offer.
Some of the things that are now getting done as "routine" in hospitals here are things that scare me a bit. Like the fact that some hospitals will already put in an epidural catheter by way of standard procedure, regardless of whether or not you intend or actually have an epidural, thus already subjecting you to some of the risks of an epidural (you now have a tube leading into your body, and potentially risking infection etc.) without any of the benefits.
All in all this was definitely a good class to attend. As it so happens, on Thursday we also got our order from Amazon.com in, finally. In it I had a number of pregnancy/childbirth and baby books, one of which I have started reading, which ties into the topic of Tuesday's class. It's a book that has come highly recommended by certain women on various pregnancy related communities on livejournal whose opinions I've come to respect, and to top it off, the package of information we received at the beginning of class contained an article by the self-same author. The book is called The Thinking Woman's Guide to a Better Childbirth and it's by Henci Goer. It's obviously slanted towards the stance that less intervention is better, and she makes no apologies for that, but she does go on to state that she has tried to remain objective, as well as list dozens of medical research studies that back up her opinion. So far I haven't read much, but I think I'm going to like this book, it definitely covers a whole range of subjects about birth, and the various options, interventions etc.
After I finish reading it, I'll surely post some kind of review, recommendation and/or summary about it.
Posted on 01:01 AM to: Pregnancy