The Baby BUSINESS is Booming

Please take a moment to read the article here from October 1st entitled "The Baby Business is Booming" from the Nashville City Paper. Afterward, feel free to read my thoughts on this and comment on my comments. lol! I can take it, I'm tough skinned...

It’s interesting that they say that hospitals in the area had been loosing money on delivering babies – when we have SO MANY hospitals delivering babies and the national figures contradict these findings (national findings put average hospital revenue for hospital-based births at 66%)… an educated conclusion would surmise that the ‘industry sources’ are simply trying to create an excuse for spending more money on the business of risk, therefore cyclically making profit off of the most lucrative source in the childbirth industry: risk. Not to mention - how daft do they assume we are to believe that going into millions of dollars of debt is going to somehow MAKE money?!?

It is disappointing that local hospitals are falling further into the same game that other hospitals nationwide have already begun playing – rather than improving our maternal and fetal mortality/morbidity rates (nationwide) by being proactive and attempting to stave off risk before it starts through alternative, though proven, healthcare options, they are merely looking to make profit off of ‘treating’ already risky situations while in the process lining their own pockets.

The US is 2nd worse in newborn death rates – which is an inexcusable ranking. Clearly, having the most current medical advancements does not improve our fetal outcomes. Spending more money on more of these same ‘specialized facilities’ is not going to solve the issue at hand, which is: how do we help to reduce the number of ‘troubled pregnancies’?

Pregnancy and childbirth is a normal and low-risk event for most women when the woman is educated, interventions are kept to a minimum, and medications are reserved for medically necessary events.

The World Health Organization, as well as the ACOG have placed the number of necessary cesareans at around 6%... why, then, is the United States rates upwards of 33%? Why, when we have an abundance of doctor’s and specialists, are women left with inadequate education, inadequate diet recommendations, and given routine interventions that have been proven to increase risk?

Rather, why not encourage women who have low-risk pregnancies to begin with to pursue the safe option of a homebirth with a certified midwife in order to free up those obstetrical beds already in hospitals area-wide? Why not encourage women to look into employing the assistance of a doula, which has been proven to reduce chances of premature birth, cesarean, medicated deliveries, and decrease general risk in pregnancy and birth. Why not encourage alternative pregnancy and childbirth classes that have been proven to reduce the rates of maternal and neonatal risk factors during pregnancy and birth?

Simply put, PROFIT.

As Baptist hospital’s Sherry stated in the article “Obstetrics is a consumer-driven field”.

Only when women begin demanding that they be given every opportunity, every morsel of information and every right to a healthy and low-risk pregnancy and birth will hospitals and doctors cease trying to raise profit and start implementing more mother-friendly healthcare policies and procedures.

Rather than spend all of that money on the high risk wing, lets work on getting pregnancy and birth back to normal, natural, and low-risk?

Again, let me direct you to this film that I am anticipating the release date of. Be assured that I will be one of the first in line at the local screening of this gem.