Forwarded with permission
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Joyce Blangiardo RN, FACCE, IBCLC
Rockville Centre, NY
[log in to unmask]
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Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 21 Oct 1996 18:34:43 -0600
From: "Sharron S. Humenick" <[log in to unmask]>
To: Multiple Recipients - Overflow Header Below <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: FW: press release for MFCI
Dear Colleague-
You may have already seen the Mother-Friendly Childbirth Initiative which is
discussed below but you may not have seen the press release or have had the
address for a www version of the document. Please send this out to the list
servs and colleague you have on internet so that as many interested people
as possible can be reached. We can circle the globe. You are encouraged
to release it to local press and newsletters. radio stations etc.
Sharron Humenick
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THE MOTHER-FRIENDLY CHILDBIRTH INITIATIVE
PRESS RELEASE - October 23, 1996 Contact --------------------
[individual or organization name here] and others announce the publication
of the Mother-Friendly Childbirth Initiative by The Coalition for Improving
Maternity Services (CIMS). The paper culminates two years of cooperative
efforts by a coalition of 25 maternity care organizations and 27 prominent
individuals.
The coalition includes professional associations of midwives, maternity care
nurses, childbirth educators, providers of labor support and postpartum home
support, breastfeeding counselors, researchers, physicians, authors, and
consumer advocates. In the aggregate, the coalition represents tens of
thousands of maternity care professionals.
The group came together to promote a wellness model of maternity care that
will improve birth outcomes for mothers and babies while considerably
reducing costs. The coalition believes that improvement in maternity care
will come by basing care on the evidence of world-wide medical research.
This care would focus on prevention and wellness, meet the psychological
and social needs of childbearing families, and stop the routine use of
high-cost, ineffective, and even harmful testing and treatment.
Dr. Marsden Wagner, a perinatal epidemiologist and an American consultant to
the World Health Organization commented: "Health is political. Genuine
democracy is served when coalitions such as this one promote change in
maternity services through initiatives which demand that the public be fully
informed. Once families are fully informed they will truly have the freedom
to choose the maternity care best suited to their own needs."
The Mother-Friendly Childbirth Initiative offers a design for moving from
the present high-cost form of maternity care where profits and fear of
lawsuits
often drive decision making to a system of partnership and cooperation
between the pregnant woman and her care givers.
The critical need for the consensus document is expressed in its preamble.
For example, the U.S. spends far more money per capita on maternity and
newborn care than any other country. Yet, the U.S. falls behind most
industrialized countries in rates of illness and death of newborns, and
maternal death rates are four times greater for African-American women than
for Euro-American women. The U.S. also has one of the world's highest
cesarean rates--more than one in five women gives birth by major
surgery--although research shows that this rate could safely be halved.
The "Principles" section of the document lists the beliefs the participants
hold in common. These include that birth can safely take place in
hospitals, birth centers or homes; that women should receive accurate and
up-to-date
information about the benefits and risks of all procedures, drugs, and tests
and have the right to give informed refusal; and that maternity care
practice should be based solely on the needs of mother and child and not any
other
person or entity.
Dr. Wagner, a ratifier of the Initiative said, "Change for the better in
maternity care will come only when the public understands the need to
convert the present doctor-friendly hospitals to mother-friendly hospitals.
The needs of the women must always come first."
CIMS plans in the near future to develop a means of officially designating
birth sites as Mother-Friendly. Meanwhile, the Ten Steps of the
Mother-Friendly Childbirth Initiative provide a checklist that home birth
services, free-standing birth centers, and hospitals can use to evaluate
their quality of care. In addition, pregnant women and professional or
consumer organizations can use the initiative to compare the quality of
services offered in their communities. For example, step 6 requires that
mother-friendly birth sites have a total cesarean rate of 10% or less in
community hospitals and 15% in high-risk hospitals and a vaginal birth after
cesarean rate of 60% or more.
For free electronic copies of the initiative visit websites:
http://www.healthy.net/cims
or
http://www.lamaze_childbirth.com
and download a digital text copie of the document. The Coalition for
Improving
Maternity Services, CIMS, has given permission to reproduce the document
with attribution, and copying is encouraged.
Visit the MFCI Forum website: http://www.healthy.net/forums.htm
for a discussion sponsored by Healthworld Online on the Mother-Friendly
Childbirth Initiative.
Please release this on October 23, our common release
date. If mailing, please send to arrive on October 23 or the next two days.
This press release is generic. Individuals or organizations may wish to
adapt it to their own use or use it as is. Please get the press release to
your local and metro newspapers, radio and TV stations, media persons you
may know, or anyone else who should receive a copy.
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