The term "midwife" can conjure up images of a stern matron, iron pressed and ready for some no-nonsense birthing, or, in the more modern era, a back-rubbing, hand-holding, motivational cheerleader who can make or break the ...
May 19, 2017
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In reaction to what midwives view as the overly medicalized way hospitals deliver babies, they have created birthing rituals to send the message that women's bodies know best.
Dec 16, 2011
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A premature baby who survived hours in a morgue refrigerator after being mistakenly declared dead showed "slight improvement" Saturday after suffering from cardiac arrest, her mother said.
Apr 15, 2012
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Many women believe that once they've had a caesarean, they are not able to give birth vaginally.
Jul 6, 2020
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Many young women do not want to start taking the contraceptive pill because they are worried that they will put on weight, or come off it because they think that they have gained weight because of it. However, a thesis from ...
Jun 7, 2011
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Maternity care that involves a midwife as the main care provider leads to better outcomes for most women, according to a systematic review published in The Cochrane Library. Researchers found that women who received continued ...
Aug 20, 2013
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Obesity raises the chances of complications and medical interventions in childbirth. But a new study by Oxford University shows the risks are not the same for all obese women.
Sep 10, 2013
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Continued care from a named midwife throughout pregnancy, birth, and after the baby is born (caseload midwifery) is just as safe as standard maternity care (shared between different midwives and medical practitioners) for ...
Sep 16, 2013
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(HealthDay) -- A five-year study of home births in Oregon found an elevated rate of deaths among babies that had to be transferred to the hospital because something went wrong during the delivery.
May 8, 2012
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For women with low-risk pregnancies who plan to give birth at home with the help of a midwife, there is no increased risk of harm to the baby, compared with a planned hospital visit, according to new research in CMAJ (Canadian ...
Dec 21, 2015
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Midwifery is a health care profession in which providers offer care to childbearing women during pregnancy, labour and birth, and during the postpartum period. They also help care for the newborn and assist the mother with breastfeeding.
A practitioner of midwifery is known as a midwife, a term used in reference to both women and men, although the majority of midwives are female. In addition to providing care to women during pregnancy and birth, many midwives also provide primary care to women, well-woman care related to reproductive health, annual gynecological exams, family planning, and menopausal care.
In the term midwife, the morpheme -wife is pronounced as expected (/waɪf/), but midwifery is normally pronounced /mɪdˈwɪf(ə)ri/ (mid-wif-(ə)ree).
Midwives are specialists in low-risk pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum, although they are trained to recognize and deal with deviations from the normal. Obstetricians, in contrast, are specialists in illness related to childbearing and in surgery. The two professions can be complementary, but may be at odds in some countries, where obstetricians are taught to "actively manage" labor, while midwives are taught not to intervene unless necessary.
Midwives refer women to general practitioners or obstetricians when a pregnant woman requires care beyond the midwives' area of expertise. In many parts of the world, these professions work together to provide care to childbearing women. In others, only the midwife is available to provide care. Midwives are trained to handle certain more difficult deliveries, including breech births, twin births and births where the baby is in a posterior position, using non-invasive techniques.
Compared with obstetricians, midwives offer lower maternity care cost, and midwife-led births are associated with lower intervention rates, reduced mortality and morbidity related to interventions, and fewer recovery complications, though this is largely due to the fact that they work with women who have low-risk pregnancies compare to obstetricians, not because there are lower risks to midwife deliveries.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
