Research shows that midwifery care in pregnancy reduces the chance of small and low birthweight babies as well as of preterm birth.
Midwifery care is shown to lead to better outcomes (again)
Category: Research Updates
Positive benefits of physiological birth
Sara Wickham highlights a research study showing the transformative benefits of physiological birth.
Induction of labour: the gap between theory and reality
Sara Wickham looks at research showing the gap between what women need and want and the reality of what they experience when undergoing induction of labour.
Routine early induction in healthy women not supported by evidence
A systematic review has concluded that induction prior to post-term is associated with few beneficial outcomes and several adverse outcomes.
Work, health and emotional lives of midwives in the United Kingdom: The UK WHELM study
A senior midwife has shared her thoughts on a study looking into the work, health and emotional lives of midwives in the UK which does not appear to have been publicised by the organisation that commissioned it, the Royal College of Midwives.
Home births – where are we heading?
We need a better way of defining postpartum haemorrhage…
It was so good to see a paper in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology this month calling for better definitions of postpartum haemorrhage (PPH). Borovac-Pinheiro et al (2018) write that, “The current definition of [postpartum haemorrhage] is inadequate…
Review shows that “evidence is lacking” to induce labour before 42 weeks of pregnancy
A review of trials comparing induction of labour with expectant management has concluded that evidence is lacking for the recommendation to induce labour at 41 weeks instead of 42 weeks for the improvement of perinatal outcome.
Bearing witness: disrespectful maternity care
Sara Wickham writes about an important study published in Birth which further illustrates the disrespectful care and abuse that some women experience during childbirth.
Objectivity, religion and belief…
I was really interested to see a feature in a recent edition of the British Medical Journal entitled “Why religious belief should be declared as a competing interest”, in which Richard Smith and Jane Blazeby suggested that people’s faith can…