Short Response 11/11

Although I am a 20 year old educated college student, reading Atul Gawande's article was just a little too graphic for me. Yes, I should be able to handle reading about child birth, but for some reason the topic was extremely un-appealing. Her discussion begins with her personal story of birth. She then goes on to discuss the technical and biological aspects of childbirth. The transformation in pelvis and cervix are quite significant during pregnancy. The pelvis bones stretch and loosen to assist the body when it's time for the baby  to emerge. The cervix also relaxes and softens to allow the baby to make its way out of the uterus. Birthing technology and techniques have been hit or miss. However, the most common technique is the Cesarian section which is commonly used to help assist a mother during the birthing process. Henci Goer discusses the fact that childbirth at home is safer than giving birth in a hospital. Midwives are said to help the child survive the dangerous first year, than a child born in a hospital. Goer believes that doctors meddle and actually increase the risk of childbirth. Personally, I was very surprised by these statistics and have never read about this phenomenon before. I would like to learn more about why giving birth at home is significantly safer than at a hospital. I would also like to know how concrete and valid her statistics are. I feel that it is easier for house- childbirth to have a safer rate because they are performed a lot less frequently than hospital births. With more children being born in hospitals there is more chance of failures / deaths.