Home Delivery of Babies
(Page 2 of 6)
On the other hand, serious complications can develop during
any birth and such complications can definitely represent a
larger danger to both mother and child in a wilderness
cabin than when encountered in a hospital. If you decide to
have your baby at home (after having gone through
properly-supervised prenatal care) with an experienced
nurse, midwife or MD in attendance, the odds are about one
in 50 that something will happen during labor and delivery
to send you to a hospital. Once in every 200 home
deliveries that "something" will be potentially
life-threatening.
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Yes, this is entirely "natural". Even wild animals
occasionally have trouble delivering and any farmer can
tell you of complications he's had delivering a cow of her
calf. It is pointless to deny—no matter how good your
"vibes"—that problems can occur. It's much better if
you know about these potential complications
before than after they happen and the
following description of some of the worst is not meant to
scare, but to inform.
TWINS, TRIPLETS, ETC.
One in every 89 deliveries results in twins and only 60% of
twin pregnancies are recognized as such prior to the actual
birth . . . so they can be quite a surprise.
A mother may suspect that she's carrying twins if her
abdomen is much bigger than seems normal and, if you have
sensitive hands you can sometimes distinguish two hard,
round baby heads instead of one when you touch the mother's
abdomen. If you want to make a more professional check for
twins, get a stethoscope at any physician's supply house
and listen for the rapid tic-tac of the unborn baby's
heart. If you hear two heart beats at different points over
the abdomen (and particularly if there's more than 10 beats
a minute difference in the pulse count) you can practically
assume you have twins coming. The diagnosis can be
confirmed by X-ray if there's any doubt.
Now twins, triplets and other multiple births are great to
have in the family once they're delivered but,
unfortunately, they frequently are born hind end first
(breech birth) and that's a difficult form of
delivery. They're also smaller in size (hence weaker for a
time) and are more apt to get sick following delivery.
Twins could be delivered at home and everything might go OK
but, if I was called upon to supervise the delivery, I
would be jumpy until both babies were out and doing well.
Any twin (any baby, in fact) weighing under four pounds
would have a better chance if taken to a hospital nursery.
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