Pushed; The Painful Truth About Childbirth and Modern Maternity Care by Jennifer Block.

Between Pushed and the book I’m reading about the Canadian Bride-Ships I think this fills my quota of feminist literature for this month, I think. Pushed is extremely interesting so far. It’s obviously about childbirth but I think her writing is fascinating. She’s very good at writing clearly and explaining terms and definitions without making me feel stupid.

She starts her first chapter with a real life example of how things are drastically different between having a natural birth that is allowed to progress normally and a hospital birth where the Dr on call uses up to 16 different interventions on a single woman. I can’t even imagine having 16 different contraptions strapped to my body while I’m trying to have a baby!

The real life example Jennifer Block uses is of the Labor and Delivery department of Florida Hospital Heartland Medical Center during Hurricane Charley. Because of the hurricane the hospital lost main power and was functioning under a back up generator which meant that “there was no air-conditioning and no lab capabilities.” The ward did not “have the lab setup required to manage epidural anesthesia safely.” The doctors and nurses had no choice but to care for the laboring women in a very different way. What followed was an amazing experience. They canceled all labor inductions and sent women home if they were not in active labor.

A nurse, Tracey Lethbridge, was working during this time and noted that “women were delivering within hours of arriving, even first time mothers, without any Pitocin… We had no cases of fetal distress during labor and no respiratory distress on neonates following delivery.

In 2004, Florida Hospital’s C-section rate was 29.4%. Nearly half of all deliveries were induced that year. During Hurricane Charley 17 women gave birth; one was induced, 2 had scheduled repeat cesareans, and only one had a cesarean for “failure to progress”. That works out to a c-section rate of 17%. Excluding the repeat cesareans that works out to 6%.

I got all of this from only the first couple pages of Jennifer Block’s book. There’s more numbers about current statistics than any other childbirth book I’ve read in the last couple years.

This book is absolutely fascinating and I think that any woman preparing to have kids should read this book and get ready to make fast decisions about her delivery experience.