NY Times: Oxford Research Encourages Homebirth over Hospital Birth in Britain

According to a recent publication in the NY Times, British researchers prove that homebirth for healthy women is safer than hospital birth.

Hospital births were more likely to end in cesarean sections or involve episiotomies, a government financed 2011 study carried out by researchers at Oxford University showed. Women were more likely to be given epidurals, which numb the pain of labor but also increase the risk of a protracted birth that required forceps and damaged the perineum.

Currently the homebirth rate is estimated to be at about 1.36% in the US whereas this study suggests that 45% of all pregnant women would be better off giving birth at home!  Granted, our system is complicated by the profit motive in a way that the UK system is not and plus, we are an awfully litigious society working from a place of fear rather than our desire for the best outcomes.

This is just one more piece of evidence to support families who chose homebirth.

In my lifetime, I hope to see the US homebirth rate reach 10%.

Read the article here: http://nyti.ms/1tOP1VB