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The dreaded "d" word

This trip to Britain is proving as interesting as ever. I’ve been keeping in touch with developments at home via the ozmidwifery mailing list and this has been very useful . Several times I have been able to tell British midwives the story of how Mareeba Midwifery Service was saved and also about the Townsville Birth Centre - the idea of women working with midwives is still very “foreign” here and to work so effectively to save or implement new services would be unheard of. When I told one group that the women had actually drawn up the architectural plans for their own birth centre (Townsville) they were amazed.

The group here in Salford (Manchester) have a variety of experience, but mostly in this area. Many work in the community and there is also a Birth Centre in Salford which sounds very good. They still use Entonox however, and as one midwife said “they didn’t think they could manage without it”. Once again I was astounded that midwives who profess to be working in a Birth Centre would consider that the use any drugs was acceptable. This was the moment to tell them the story about the hazards of nitrous oxide. The article I have written for The Practising Midwife on the risks to midwives of using nitrous oxide is at the final page proof stage and will be published in a few weeks.

We had the usual discussion about the use of language and the need to be “woman friendly” and “woman centred” in midwifery care. Even when we have talked extensively about the implications of the word “delivery” and the need to drop this in favour of “birth”, British midwives seem incapable of making any changes. One day I will start a system of penalties, and ask everyone to put 50 pence in a jar every time they use the “delivery” word during the program. The profit (and I anticipate a healthy sum) I can give to an appropriate charity.

Posted by andrea at June 28, 2005 04:08 AM