ACOG requests unsourced anecdotal home birth "data"

As a NICU nurse, there's no freaking way I'd have a home delivery. I think this sector needs to be tightly regulated, as ACOG suggests, although they were a bit naive putting out that question amongst the fury of the "natural birth" folks.

I think people are so programmed into thinking and believing that the "safest" way to birth a child IS in the hospital and therefore, are quick to dismiss the positive results of home births. There are lots of women who do not want an obstetrician involved in their birthing experience; for many reasons I understand. I agree with Setmctenn, license midwives!

exactly. Because they escalated to be that way. Why would a woman want to risk her baby in such a manner otherwise?

I don't want this to turn into an argument over the benefits or lack thereof homebirths...but it's just in my experience seeing all the broken families that I have every single day, in JUST my opinion, I wouldn't do a home birth.

Too many families had the "perfect" pregnancy...up until the labor started or unexpected events that the US didn't pick up on...or a million other things.

Maybe after you have more than one year of nursing experience under your belt, you will be able to see more than the one side of the issue. After more than 25 years of L and D experience, I became burned out from seeing far too many low risk women being treated automatically as high risk, with more interventions than the situations called for, leading quickly to a cascade of problems, often distressing the fetus. Many of these occurred due to physicians "failure to wait", not labor's "failure to progress". When a woman doesn't follow the Friedman's curve exactly, they start sharpening the scalpels. If a woman isn't moving along quickly enough, put in the epidural PRONTO, "we have to crank up the pitocin, and blast this kid out. " An unanesthetized woman is nothing but a fussy, whiny pain in the behind to many of them, as a woman should just be silent during this process.
I believed somewhat as you did, when I was a new nurse- but saw too many bad outcomes from too much UNNECESSARY intervention. What it did to traumatize the mothers was immeasurable. Sometimes these interventions can save a life, or even two. But, all too often, they are used with impatience and poor judgement. Time really opened my eyes. (PS- I worked in large city hospitals, with patients along the entire spectrum.)

Maybe after you have more than one year of nursing experience under your belt, you will be able to see more than the one side of the issue. After more than 25 years of L and D experience, I became burned out from seeing far too many low risk women being treated automatically as high risk, with more interventions than the situations called for, leading quickly to a cascade of problems, often distressing the fetus. Many of these occurred due to physicians "failure to wait", not labor's "failure to progress". When a woman doesn't follow the Friedman's curve exactly, they start sharpening the scalpels. If a woman isn't moving along quickly enough, put in the epidural PRONTO, "we have to crank up the pitocin, and blast this kid out. " An unanesthetized woman is nothing but a fussy, whiny pain in the behind to many of them, as a woman should just be silent during this process.
I believed somewhat as you did, when I was a new nurse- but saw too many bad outcomes from too much UNNECESSARY intervention. What it did to traumatize the mothers was immeasurable. Sometimes these interventions can save a life, or even two. But, all too often, they are used with impatience and poor judgement. Time really opened my eyes. (PS- I worked in large city hospitals, with patients along the entire spectrum.)

Respectfully, I think you misread my post. I was talking about HOME deliveries. Not birthing centers or hospitals where midwives are present. I've also done extensive research on the elective c-section issue and so have read a lot about the unnecessary interventions as a side topic--I agree that there are too many unnecessary interventions.