Caesarean section births are often thought to be safer. In fact they disrupt the natural bond between mother and baby and can interrupt brain development.
Discontinuing expanded health-care funding will result in less prenatal care for uninsured patients, more health risks, higher costs to the health system, and moral distress for health-care providers.
While sepsis is considered to be a preventable cause of maternal death, it continues to be a major cause of women dying during or after childbirth, even in Australia.
We looked at almost 300,000 births and found those mothers in the private system were more likely to have a caesarean – even if they didn’t really want or need one.
Many pregnant women who request planned caesarean deliveries are simply told no, despite guidelines advising doctors who disagree to offer referral or transfer care.
Compared to women who give birth in a birth centre, those who give birth in hospitals are much more likely to have interventions – from epidurals, to labour augmentation and caesarean deliveries.
Childbirth used to be a terrifying ordeal. But women were surrounded by others – mothers, aunts, sisters – who brought love and experience. But midway through the 19th century, this changed.
A new study has found a link between being born by caesarean section and having a greater chance of being diagnosed with autism or ADHD. But there’s no evidence caesarean sections cause them.
Evidence suggests that microbes play a vital role in health. But what microbes we get depends whether we were born in a hospital versus at home. That could impact our health decades later.
Professional bodies say that vaginal births after caesareans are safe and usually successful. So why do doctors often recommend that women go back under the knife?
New study finds that giving birth through an emergency caesarean increases the risk of developing postnatal depression in the first nine months after childbirth by about 15%.
Research Fellow University of Notre Dame Australia; Adjunct Fellow (National Institute of Complementary Medicine), Western Sydney University, University of Notre Dame Australia
SHARP Professor, Vitalities Lab, Centre for Social Research in Health and Social Policy Centre, and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society, UNSW Sydney