Health Ministers ensure Australian women can continue to birth at home with midwives
MEDIA RELEASE 10 August 2012
Homebirth Australia congratulates Federal, State and Territory Health Ministers for ensuring midwives can continue to provide care to Australian women for birth at home.
Australian Health Ministers met in Sydney today for a meeting of the Standing Council on Health (SCoH) and agreed to extend the professional indemnity insurance exemption for privately practising midwives and agreed to vary the determination on collaborative arrangements required of midwives.
Midwives across Australia have found it virtually impossible to obtain collaborative agreements with individual doctors as required under the current legislation.
Some midwives had approached more than 40 doctors and obstetricians and all had refused citing advice from their insurance company or the AMA. This requirement for Collaborative Arrangements had resulted in fractured care for women and impacted on the safety of homebirth in Australia.
“The safety of Australian women and babies must come first in maternity care reforms. Ensuring the workforce of private midwives across Australia can continue to function efficiently and effectively is one of the most important things that can be done to ensure the safety of homebirth in Australia”, said Homebirth Australia spokesperson, Michelle Meares.
“We congratulate the Health Ministers on fixing this problem that midwives have been reporting since 2010 when the Determination was passed.”
“The extension of the exemption for indemnity insurance for private midwives for homebirth is a positive move as it allows the best possible system to be put in place that will not have the unintended outcome of denying some Australian women and babies access to professional midwifery care at home,” Ms Meares said.
‘Whenever Australian women give birth at home, they must have professional midwives available to care for them and their babies, and any policy or legislation put in place must be scrutinised to ensure that it will not have the unsafe consequence of leaving women abandoned without access to midwives.”
“The Australian Medical Association has expressed outrage at this move claiming it will allow midwives to practise independently. Yet this is what women who choose homebirth want. Women choose homebirth with an independent midwife so they can be guaranteed care by the midwife of their choice and make their own decisions about the care in collaboration with their chosen care provider during pregnancy and birth,” Ms Meares said.
“Women need respectful collaborative maternity care – they must have access to the whole spectrum of maternity care professionals according to their unique needs and the decision about who to involve in her care must remain with the woman and her family.”
Contact: Michelle Meares 0439 645 372
Collaboration was the focus of the National Guidance on Collaborative Maternity Care commissioned by the Department of Health and Ageing and released in 2010 from the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC). In it’s discussion of collaboration this document states:
A woman decides who she involves in this decision-making process, be it a health professional, partner, doula, her extended family, friends or community, and should be free to consider their advice without being pressured, coerced, induced or forced into care that is not what she desires (McLean and Petersen 1996). Women have the right to decline care or advice if they choose, or to withdraw consent at any time. Therefore, if a woman declines care or advice based on the information provided, her choice must be respected (UNESCO 2005). Importantly, women should not be ‘abandoned’ because of their choice (FPA Health and Read 2006, Faunce 2008; NHMRC consultations 2009).
Finally some good news! That’s fantastic. My homebirth was the best moment of my life and I hope that all women can have that choice and experience if they want it!! X
Bravo. Having my baby at home after an horrendous birth experience in the hospital for my first baby was the most amazing and rewarding thing I have done. My daughter was born drug free into the care of people who knew and cared for us both. She was very healthy and the post birth time was fantastic.Every mother and baby should have the opportunity to have this experience if they choose. Both my parents were born at home and my nieces, nephews and grand children have been happpily born at home.
Ditto to what Rachana wrote – my story is almost identical and I am still euphoric after my daughter’s homebirth 11 days ago.
It is critical that all women (not just those assessed as ‘low risk’) are able to give birth in their chosen location with the assistance of skilled/qualified midwives. I have a thyroid condition (controlled by medication) and this condition and my maternal age (41) would have ruled me out of eligibility for any hospital run homebirth program or ‘collaborative’ arrangement with an ob/gyn.
I gave birth to my daughter drug free at home in our spa in 6 hours and it was the most beautiful and natural experience of my life with no postpartum complications…
Birth rights are human rights!
What amazing news and what amazing women to comment after
I totally agree with Susan Courtney, after birthing twins at home as a VBAC, Grand Multiparous, and at the age of 39, we all would have been robbed of an amazing and empowering birth times two, if I’d had no option other than to comply with what is considered necessary for such a high risk birth.
And I was lucky and grateful to have recently birthed my 8th child beautifully and sensually at home with my brood and love and a midwife who was willing to be with us in such an inhospitable home birthing climate.
Maybe now that midwives and women and families can stop expending energy on trying to keep options open for birthing women, we can instead start building our stories and experiences and delving deeper into the mysteries of birth, the importance of timing and gentle births, and the impact of birth on future generations. And maybe now we can start creating spaces where women of any creed or belief or fear or judgement can come and talk honestly about birth, and feel acknowledged as they pick their own particular path to the great initiation that it is.
This is such fantastic news.
To support women in their birth choices is such a wonderful acknowledgement of our rights and differences.
I’ve birthed in the public hospital and also birthed at home. There is very little I would change for either experience, because they were right for me at the time and I am glad for the choice to explore both experiences.
Both provided me with a healthy child with good support.
For a woman to feel in the most comfortable environment,in control of her choices, with her most desired support network is vital for her first experiences in becoming a mother and having a child.
May all women be able to birth as they choose. May all women feel empowered with all available information at the ready for this beautiful time in their lives.
I dont suppose a home birth midwife is covered by medicare, as they would be in a public hospital.
Hi Nerida
Currently there is no medicare rebate available for birth at home. There is rebates available for antenatal and post natal care from some eligible midwives – so whilst you can’t recover any money for the birth you can for the costs of appointments before the birth and after the birth. Best to check with individual midwives if they have this option available.
In some areas there are publically funded homebirth programmes i.e. free of charge for the birth plus antenatal / postnatal care by your midwife provided that you have a medicare card.