9 February 2015
Evidence Based Birth – Rebecca Dekker
In April 2014, waterbirth—an alternative method for pain relief in which a mother gives birth in a tub of warm water—made national headlines.
The event that pushed water birth safetyinto the spotlight was a joint Opinion Statement from the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), denouncing the practice.
In their opinion statement, ACOG and the AAP firmly admonished that waterbirth should be considered an experimental practice that should only occur in the context of a clinical research study.
Their conclusion, which echoed a previous AAP Opinion Statement from 2005, was based on their opinion that water birth does not have any benefits and may pose dangers for the newborn.
In response, the American College of Nurse Midwives (ACNM),(Midwives 2014) the American Association of Birth Centers (AABC), and the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) all released statements endorsing waterbirth as a safe, evidence-based option.
Meanwhile, the AABC released preliminary data from nearly 4,000 waterbirths that occurred in birth centers all over the U.S., supporting water birth as safe for mothers and infants.
Despite the response from midwifery organizations and the AABC, hospitals all over the U.S. began suspending or shutting down their waterbirth programs.
At St. Elizabeth’s Regional Medical Center in Lincoln, Nebraska, mothers and families organized rallies and started a change.org petition to bring waterbirth back.
All of this controversy left us with these questions— Is the ACOG/AAP statement based on a complete and accurate review of the literature?
What is the evidence on waterbirth?
Is it safe?
Does it have any potential benefits or harms for mothers and infants?
These are the questions we will address in the Evidence Based Birth article on the evidence on waterbirth.
This article was published July 10, 2014, by Rebecca Dekker, PhD, RN, APRN
© Evidence Based Birth, All Rights Reserved.
Click here for a copy of Rebecca Dekker’s paper on the safety of water birth
