Maternity services. Volume II, Minutes of evidence.

Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. Health Committee

Date:: 1992

Catalogue details

Licence: Open Government Licence

Credit: Maternity services. Volume II, Minutes of evidence. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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16 January 1992] [Continued [Chairman Cont] for a wonderful experience; it gives you a rest, it takes the weight of your body, which can be quite heavy when labouring for a while, it is warm, it envelops you, it is really a lovely feeling. Then when the baby is actually born it feels like a very, very peaceful birth for the baby as well as for the mother. So, as I said, I cannot say it is better than any other way because I have not done it any other way. For me it was a wonderful way to give birth. I do not intend to have any more but, if I ever did, I would do the same again. Three times it has been wonderful. Mr Rowe: Do you think we could achieve the same degree of peacefulness if we met under water? Chairman: Are you referring to you and me or the witnesses? Mr Rowe: The witnesses. Chairman: Perhaps Mrs Nash will tell us. (Ms Nash) [have never given birth under water but I did swim before giving birth and I suppose I have just heard so much that echoes my own feelings and experiences. I have not had a home birth yet but my second baby is due in the middle of February. With my first child, who is now two and a half, I felt instinctively that I wanted to give birth at home and I got a lot of support from my husband who, I think, was worried, like I was, about the risks of that but felt that if I thought them through enough and was prepared to go ahead with that he would be very much in support of that. So when our first port of call was to our GP, which is what all the antenatal books I had said, I was quite interested in the question that was raised about the proposal that the first port of call should be a midwife. In fact when I met my GP we had just moved from Oxfordshire to London in my fifth month of pregnancy, which was not really a good time to move but was unavoidable because of jobs. The first thing I had to do was to sign on with the new GP and I asked people around who might be sympathetic towards home births. I consulted the NCT. It was a very confusing time for us as a family. The only GP anyone could suggest in our area who might be sympathetic was extremely helpful. She talked to me for about three-quarters of an hour in the surgery but was very clear about the fact that she felt that I should compromise and go on the ‘““domino” scheme, which is what I did do because, when you have not been through labour and pregnancy before, you are terrified of taking risks and when professionals tell you,there are many risks about not being in hospital, you do actually instinctively take that advice. 1572. Are you implying by that that you do not think you were actually given real objective choice? (Ms Nash) | am. That is something I wanted to come on to because although I cannot remember exactly what the point was, but Virginia Bottomley made a point about needing to know what women’s choices are and then putting these into practice; but I hope that the Government will take a longer period than maybe they envisage before they take evidence from women and their partners because I actually feel that at the moment true choice is not available when you first go to your antenatal clinic because you get a very one-sided view about risk, that influences women a great deal. | think it influences every woman and it will be a long time before women can somehow re-educate themselves to trust their instincts. That will not happen overnight and that will not happen simply by suddenly being presented with informed choices on both sides. I think that is actually a cultural re-education and I think that will take a few decades possibly I do not know. So I hope that maybe a long timespan will be given or they will not be rushed decisions because, yes, I do not feel I was given enough on the pro side towards home birth, and we did not have much time. We felt we had to get on and make the decision. So I took a compromise. I had all my antenatal care at St George’s—shared between St George’s Hospital, Tooting, and the community midwives. My experience was that everything to do with the antenatal clinic run by the community midwives*. was extremely positive, everything to do with antenatal clinics at St George’s was extremely negative—very long waits and on meeting the consultant for the first time after a 24 hour wait to see this particular doctor he did not introduce himself to me. I feel that is actually quite an important thing when you are meeting someone, the naming. I was seen as a body, A, B or C—I do not know what. That is very difficult when you are also feeling very exposed, both in a physical sense—you are uncovered from here to here (indicating) with people examining your nipples, your everything; that is not easy—and it is also such an important time for and say ““What will happen to me when I do come in to your hospital and I am under your care?”’. In fact, I suppose it was a ten-minute examination—I cannot remember—without knowing this consultant’s name. 1573. Did you ever get to know him? (Ms Nash) I could have asked him. I never saw him again. I could have asked him and I spent the ten minutes thinking, shall I ask him to introduce himself to me, and I think you are very frightened of sticking your neck out in hospital. I worked for the Lothian Health Board for four years when I was living in Edinburgh and so from the other side I am aware of some of the difficulties about being under professional care or having power over the patient and actually I think that experience made me very worried about making myself unpopular in the hospital where I was to give birth. So I decided not to take the risk and be thought cheeky which might go down on my notes, so I held my tongue and lost my temper afterwards. So they were small things but they seemed very big at the time. In fact, I did not have the baby at St George’s at all because my waters broke suddenly in a motorway service area, luckily in Wales, where we were whisked into the Bridgend Hospital. We drove into Bridgend Hospital in South Wales and had, I think, probably as good an experience as most people ever have in hospital. I was delivered by the senior midwife there, who examined me when I first went in and said, “‘Oh, I’m itching to do a good natural birth.’”’ Those were not her actual words, but she certainly conveyed the sense of looking forward to assisting at a normal delivery. So she came and she altered her timetable and gave us * Note by witness: Apart from my first visit to the hospital, I saw community midwives at St Christopher’s Clinic in Battersea, which was run more efficiently than the hospital antenatal clinic.