andrewducker: (Default)
andrewducker ([personal profile] andrewducker) wrote2011-11-25 11:00 am

Interesting Links for 25-11-2011

[identity profile] dalglir.livejournal.com 2011-11-25 06:55 pm (UTC)(link)
It turns out that I am an opinionated old fart, lucky enough to have friends like Andy who are patient enough to keep arguing their corner. The result was that I went away, read some more around the topic and am now more sympathetic to other point of view.

Hurray!

[identity profile] alitheapipkin.livejournal.com 2011-11-25 07:16 pm (UTC)(link)
I can entirely sympathise with your position given your experience, it's very hard to be objective about medical statistics when it's you or your family whose lives are saved (I made a similar point here about mammograms).

[identity profile] alitheapipkin.livejournal.com 2011-11-25 08:15 pm (UTC)(link)
As well as the chances of catching MRSA etc, hospital births tend to be 60 % longer, which can increase the chances of complications. In a hospital, a woman is more likely to give birth on her back (not helped by a lot of medical professionals who think you need to be lying down if you have monitors attached to you) which is apparently much worse than squatting.

(This info is via the Boy who is training to be a nurse; I'd look up some articles to reference but a) I should be working or turning the laptop off and b) no-one without a journal subscription is likely to be able to read them)

I'm unclear whether the data on the length of hospital births is comparing like-for-like births, or whether it is affected by higher risk births being almost entirely hospital based, unfortunately.