“The Score” by Atul Gawande and “How Childbirth Went Industrial: A Deconstruction” by Henci Goer gave me some conflicting information about the child birthing process. “The Score” explains how that the process has become industrialized through the use of doctors and hospitals instead of at home with a midwife. However unlike the other article, Atul Gawande has a problem with this because it’s taking away one of the only natural processes we have left. C-sections are being performed even with out trying to do a natural one. Gawande says, “We are losing our connection to yet another natural process of life (Gawande 10).” This is the main problem Atul Gawande has with births in hospitals. Henci Goer has a different take on births in hospitals; she believes that births in hospitals are not safer than births done at home. The stats she gives are unbelievable: “The perinatal death rate for high-risk births in homes or small unit (15.5/1000) was slightly lower than that for low-risk births in the hospital (17.9/1000)…which suggests that hospital labor managements actually intensified risks (Goer 3).” Her whole argument is that hospital birth doesn’t increase safety for the mom and baby. I was kind of confused by both these articles because the 1st article made it seem like hospital births were safe while the second article makes it seem like house births are a lot safer. I can’t see house births being safer than being in hospital, but I understand it being less stressful and having the midwife would help calm you also. But if something went wrong, I don’t understand how they fixed it, but if you think about it, ancient people didn’t have all the medicine we have and they managed to populate the earth. Most women want a natural birth, but they want a safe birth most of all.
No comments:
Post a Comment