The Center for Holistic Birth: An Organized Step Back in Time When Birthing Worked

Sunday, June 16, 2013

Title: The Center for Holistic Birth: An Organized Step Back in Time When Birthing Worked

Ryman Hall B4 (Gaylord Opryland)
Heidi Brenner, CNM, AHN , The Center for Holistic Birth, The Valley Hospital, Ridgewood, NJ

Discipline: Advanced Practice (AP), Childbearing (CB), Professional Issues (PI), Women’s Health (WH)

Learning Objectives:
  1. Describe methods to encourage women to take control of their Birth experience
  2. Formulate a framework to begin the process of reassessing and changing the practice of the staff, the patients and the Obstetricians.
  3. Identify barriers to practicing in a Holistic Environment
Submission Description:
Purpose for the program: When left alone most of the time a woman will birth her baby with no complications. In the current health  care climate, during a woman's pregnancy she is faced with many interventions.  These interventions are changing the climate of birth in many institutions across the country.  Medical Professionals ordering inductions and other interventions, patients not knowing what they are and nurses being caught in the middle.  How do we change the current climate?

Proposed change: Incoporate an evidence based holistic approach utilizing Jean Watson's Nursing Theory to affect patients to remind them of their innate abilities.

Implementation, outcomes and evaluation: After meeting with Departments throughout the institution to discuss the foundation of the program, referrals from various sources started.  Patients meet with the Certified Nurse Midwife multiple times during their pregnancy depending on their gestation, for no fee.  They discuss resources for education and formulating a "Birth Path".  Meetings also cover different birthing options and practices and allow patients to explore what is right for them.  After the last meeting prior to delivery the CNM writes up a summation of the meetings that she had with the patient and attached a copy of the patient's birth path.  This information is attached to the patient's prenatal which allows staff to view it at the time of the patient's admission.

Implications for nursing practice: Holistic Birth is not equated with natural birth, but as the program has grown it has become increasingly apparent that woman want to experience the most they can from their birth no matter what drew them to the program initally.  Although within the program the epidural and cesarian section rates are significantly lower, another important trend has risen to the surface.  Woman who participate in this program feel empowered to ask questions, challenge the status quo and be an active patricipant in the decisions regarding their birth. All of which has culminated into a satifying, rewarding experience-regardless of the outcome.

Keywords: lower c/s rate-empowering woman-holistic birth

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