Betty-Anne Daviss

• Professor (Associate) at Carleton University

Invitation to respond to the commentary, “Upright Breech Birth: New Video Research Risks Reviving Friedman's Curse.” Although others have been observing breech mechanisms and videos for some time,1,2 we were the first to undertake and report with data the results of a systematic study.3 We welcome our findings to be refined or altered, with larger...

Birth-related decisions principally center on safety; giving birth during a pandemic brings safety challenges to a new level, especially when choosing the birth setting. Amid the COVID-19 crisis, the concurrent work furloughs, business failures, and mounting public and private debt have made prudent expenditures an inescapable second concern. This...

Objective: To compare breech outcomes when mothers delivering vaginally are upright, on their back, or planning cesareans. Methods: A retrospective cohort study was undertaken of all women who presented for singleton breech delivery at a center in Frankfurt, Germany, between January 2004 and June 2011. Results: Of 750 women with term breech de...

Background: Increasing U.S. prematurity and caesarean section rates are central to rapidly increasing maternity care costs. Epidemiologic research on planned home births with midwives has demonstrated safety for low-risk women, reduced caesarean section rates, and lower prematurity rates. Methods: We examined the rates and trends in preterm, low bi...

There are different interpretations of breech studies in general and the Term Breech Trial in particular, a much publicized study that suggested caesarean section to be safer for breech delivery for the neonate than vaginal delivery. It is not surprising that different countries, different cultures, and different professions have arrived at a multi...

Background: A number of new home birth studies have been published internationally in the last couple of years. Methods: We evaluated six new published home birth studies from Great Britain, the Netherlands, Sweden, Australia and two from Canada (provinces of Ontario and British Columbia). Through interaction with the authors, we explored the his...

Delamothe queries why the authors of an American meta-analysis on planned home and hospital birth shifted focus from perinatal mortality to neonatal mortality “despite having relevant data for these calculations on only 9% of their total sample.”1 2The authors found no difference in perinatal mortality between planned home and planned hospital birt...

We wished to gain insight into Canadian hospital policy changes between 2000 and 2007 in response to (1) the initial results of the Term Breech Trial suggesting delivery by Caesarean section was preferable for term breech presentation, and (2) the trial's two-year follow-up and other research and commentary suggesting that risks associated with vag...

The 1985 World Health Organization statement "There is no justification for any region to have caesarean section (CS) rates higher than 1015%" has been revisited several times over the last 25 years. Recently Betran et al. again found that 15% was a marker below which there is a correlation with increased maternal mortality and perinatal mortality...

Much of the social science and midwifery literature published in the last three decades heavily critiques the obstetrical treatment of birth. Rather than adding to this growing body of properly critical literature, we decided to take a positive and constructive approach, describing birth models that work. As the type of education practitioners rece...

We compared the neonatal mortality rate among 5,418 planned homebirths attended by Certified Professional Midwives in the year 2000 (CPM2000 study) to the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) neonatal mortality rate for births in hospital to U.S. non-Hispanic white women of 37 weeks plus gestation. Prematurity rates were also examined for the t...

Many obstetrical societies claim that the hospital-based obstetric approach to childbirth is safer with respect to perinatal mortality than the natural approach to childbirth as administered by midwives and some physicians in free-standing birth centers or at home, but the scientific evidence does not support that view. The objective of the study...

Outcomes of planned home births with certified professional midwives: large prospective study in North America, published June 18, 2005 in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), concluded that Certified Professional Midwives attending home births had similar perinatal mortality outcomes to low risk hospital birth but with to 1/10 the number of caesarea...

Postpartum hemorrhage (PPH) is the main cause of maternal mortality. Yet, even though solutions have been identified, governments and donor countries have been slow to implement programs to contain the problem. While poverty and low educational level remain the underlying cause of PPH, the current literature suggests that active management of the t...

To evaluate the safety of home births in North America involving direct entry midwives, in jurisdictions where the practice is not well integrated into the healthcare system. Prospective cohort study. All home births involving certified professional midwives across the United States (98% of cohort) and Canada, 2000. All 5418 women expecting to deli...

Editor—Josefson reports on a study by Lydon-Rochelle et al that found that induction of labour was associated with increased risk of uterine rupture.1 Although the research isolated prostaglandins from other forms of induction, it failed to isolate those women induced specifically with oxytocic drugs and those who were not induced but were given au...

There is a tension between traditional and modern definitions of reproductive risk and normalcy. These experts describe that tension as it plays out among the Inuit of Northern Canada from the perspective of a community midwife who has worked with the Inuit. She presents an analytical framework which classifies and illuminates the types of logic th...

There is a tension between traditional and modern definitions of reproductive risk and normalcy. This excerpt describes that tension as it plays out among the Inuit of Northern Canada from the perspective of a community midwife who has worked with the Inuit. She presents an analytical framework which classifies and illuminates the types of logic th...

SUMMARY

Abstracto Objetivo : evaluar la seguridad ,de los ,partos domiciliarios en Norte América con la participación de parteras en jurisdicciones donde la práctica no está completamente,integrada al sistema de salud. Estudio: Prospectivo de grupo. Entorno: Todos los nacimientos atendidos por parteras profesionales graduadas a través de los Estados Unidos...