Caesarean Births Are at a High in U.S.

[alp227]

Source: The New York Times

The Caesarean section rate in the United States reached 32 percent in 2007, the country’s highest rate ever, health officials are reporting.

The rate has been climbing steadily since 1996, setting records year after year, and Caesarean section has become the most common operation in American hospitals. About 1.4 million Caesareans were performed in 2007, the latest year for which figures are available.

The increases — documented in a report published Tuesday — have caused debate and concern for years.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/24/health/24birth.html

[truedelphi]

1. A local Sonoma Calif. newspaper has discussed this as well.

It is a really misguided thing. It is obvious that thirty three percent of American women should not require C-sections. Typically, a two week delay in birthing a normal "pregnancy" baby was not seen as a horrible thing. But now someone has cooked the books and gotten people everywhere to believe that the woman has to deliver their child on their due date or before.

That way, I guess they can charge so much more for the procedure.

BTW a C-section drastically increases the numbers of women who end up with serious postpartum depression. Maybe that is the whole point? Let's get everyone we can on these anti-depressants.
Big Pharam market share should not ever suffer, even while making women and their families suffer.

[diane in sf]

2. This is unnatural, damaging, and sick--sounds like a money and CYA thing

[Samantha]

3. But this article gives little or no attention to natural births which

should have been C-sections. My daughter had her first child ten months ago. I had been telling her since I saw the sonogram at 4 months that she was going to have a big baby. She is a rather small woman, like me. The baby's head was huge. I kept asking her (casually) during the duration of the pregnancy if she had asked her doctor about the weight of the child. She did not do this. A week before the birth, I again asked. She said, "Oh, Mom, they don't know."

Her labor started on her due date. When it came time for the child to be born, the baby could not exit the birth canal. The baby's head and shoulders were simply too big. There was a frenzy at the last moment, and her doctor YANKED the baby out. While at first it was thought her collar-bone was broken, that turned out not to be the case. However, her right shoulder, arm and hand had nerve damage from the tremendous squeeze she experienced when being forced through the canal. Months of physical therapy ensued. Today she is almost normal.

Her height and head size measure in the 25% percentile of babies her age. She is going to be a very tall woman. I believe her doctor made a terrible guesstimate that my daughter could deliver this baby normally, when obviously she could not. C-sections are sometimes necessary, and my daughter was subsequently told if she planned any more children, she should plan on a C-Section.

The only thing I am saying is that both sides of the issue should have been discussed in the article. It seemed a little one-sided.

Sam

[defendandprotect]

7. Average rates for C-sections are something like 3% ... 7% range... we are at 32%+... overboard-!!

These are the numbers as I recall them --

I think Cesareans are also going up in other countries as they also move

to the ultrasound machines. Basically, many believe that these machines

also cause distress to the fetus -- that the fetus can be seen trying to

move away from the electrical impulse?



NOTE: NJ 38.3% - Florida 37.2%


Obviously, something is very wrong in US!

[BadgerKid]

16. Overboard, likely, but your physics is awry.

Ultrasound is sound beyond the range of hearing, not electricity.

[BlueIris]

4. Yet another symptom of our misogynist and broken health care system.

Fat, lazy asshole doctors and opportunistic insurance companies are killing us all.

[sharp_stick]

5. You do like a broad brush don't you?

Perhaps there are just one or two reasons why a C-section is required and perhaps not all doctors are fat and or lazy and or assholes but whatever floats your boat.

[laconicsax]

15. Perhaps you're not terribly well informed on the subject.

Perhaps you should read up on it before attacking a hyperbolic, but accurate comment.

[sharp_stick]

19. Would it be my MD or my PhD

that makes me not well informed on the subject?

I'm no Ob/Gyn but I did my rotations during med school and I'm willing to put some money on my being a little better informed than your average bear.

Calling a comment hyperbolic but accurate is pretty close to the same and saying it is wrong but right.

[laconicsax]

20. So you should understand what "cascade of interventions" means.

You should also understand how the hospital birth system tends to prescribe unnecessary C-sections to uninformed patients. If you're an MD, you should know that the rate of C-sections in this country is almost double what the WHO and the American College of Ob/Gyn feels it should be. Hell, you could be a layperson with a room temperature IQ and still know that just from reading the linked article.

Also, possession of a PhD is meaningless unless its in a related subject area. Since you admit to not being a birth specialist, I'm going to assume mentioning it is simply an extension of the appeal to authority you're falling back on, only with less substance than the mention that you're an MD.

Perhaps I could have been more clear. The accurate part is the subject heading and the hyperbolic part is the message.

Saying that you're not an Ob/Gyn but you did some rotations an unspecified number of years ago is pretty close to saying, "I'm no mathematician, but I took a few credits in college."

[Crunchy Frog]

24. About 10-15% are medically justified.

The rest are medical laziness, greed, or CYA.

[defendandprotect]

9. Thoroughly agree with you .. . and the future will only hold more damage to women's health...

My daughter regularly has reported to me her friends are scheduling

having labor induced for convenience.

Currently, a friend's family also here in NJ has had complications from a

Cesarean with a recurring infection and she has now been hospitalized for the

second time due to the infection/fever.

I won't argue against the Cesarean, itself, in her case because she had a split womb.

Evidently, they can't always tell that's the case until someone is pregnant?

Baby has less room in half the womb. More difficult for it to turn.

Fortunately, the baby is OK --

[KittyWampus]

11. I can think if quite a few women who wanted their deliveries scheduled.

[defendandprotect]

14. Often, they are being encouraged by their physicians, not cautioned against it --

which should be the case --

[Dulcinea]

18. Same here.

In my pregnant yoga class, I recall one woman saying, "I want to put the birth date in my day planner." Really.

Also, a lot of working women only get so much time off after a baby is born, & they want to tell their HR dept. what time off they'll need. It cuts no ice with their company to say they have no idea what day the baby will be born, so they schedule the delivery. Only 5% of babies are born on their due date!

And, there's the vanity factor. Some women seem to be convinced that a vaginal delivery will make them less HOT.

[Renew Deal]

6. Profits need to be made!

:shrug:

[defendandprotect]

10. All OBGYN's are surgeons . . . a hammer looking for a nail?

Having a surgeon care for a pregnant woman is almost asking for trouble ...

Midwifes should be returned to their natural place -- with a surgeon nearby,

if needed.

[laconicsax]

21. +1

[kestrel91316]

8. That's obscene.

[KittyWampus]

12. Some women want the delivery scheduled. Also, maternal obesity probably plays a factor

in doctors delivering surgically.

[defendandprotect]

13. If "maternal obesity" were a factor, it would complicate surgical rather than

vaginal delivery --

[Matilda]

17. We also have a high rate of elective Ceasarean births in Australia.

In 2009, it was one in three births.

We don't have much of a parental leave scheme here, and many working women have only three months off after giving
birth. They schedule the Ceasarean so they know exactly when to apply for leave. It's sad that some women are
forced to do this because their employer isn't flexible.

I do know some women though who think Ceasareans are a good way to go because they don't get a stretched vagina,
and the baby isn't born as wrinkled as with normal delivery. I'm not kidding - they have a pretty baby and a
pretty vagina after birth.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

22. I had a planned but unscheduled C section in 1985.

Got to term, water broke, went to the hospital, NO dropping, NO dilation, kid was stuck diagonally in my uterus. I knew I had to have a c section b/c I'm a small person (five foot three, small boned, small framed) and had an eight pounder. This was after about five hours of pitocin. I have no idea why they decided to give me pitocin when the doctor KNEW I had to have a c section.

Anyway she is grown and healthy now. A C section saved my life and my daughter's life.

[HuckleB]

23. Why is the Cesarean rate sky high?

http://skepticalob.blogspot.com/2010/03/why-is-cesarean-rate-sky-high.html

An interesting piece by an OB blogger. I actually don't much care for her blog posts, most of the time, but this one seems to be quite well thought out.