What equipment is carried by Midwives for Home
Births?
Do all Midwives support and attend Home Births?
Do Doctors support Home Births and are they willing
to attend if the women chooses?
What services do the Home Birth Associations offer?
Do the Home Birth Associations offer any special
equipment for hire? If so what are they and what is
the cost to couples for hire?
What equipment or materials do the birthing couple
have to provide for a Home Birth?
What is the difference between home and hospital
births?
What equipment is carried by Midwives for Home Births?
The birthing and safety equipment
carried by Home Birth midwives is comparable to what you
could expect to find at a birthing centre, so this means
Home Birth Midwives are well equipped to deal with any
emergencies. As an example this equipment will generally
include:
-
Birthing Pack (including cord
clamps and sterile scissors)
-
Sterile gloves and swabs
-
Doppler, Pinard and/or
Stethoscope (for listening to baby’s heart rate
during labour)
-
Sphygmomanometer (for taking
Blood pressure recordings)
-
Thermometer (for taking
temperature recordings)
-
Oxygen cylinder and Resuscitation
equipment including oral suction equipment
-
Ecbolic medications (such as
syntocinon and syntometrine for use in case of
excessive blood loss)
-
Intravenous setups, sterile
solutions
-
Cannulation equipment,
tourniquet, syringes and needles
-
Suturing Equipment
Do all Midwives support and attend Home Births?
Home Birth Aotearoa believes that
midwives are the guardians of normal birth and that the
setting most likely to encourage this is at home
therefore it
makes sense that the majority of midwives are supportive
of homebirth. However unfortunately not all midwives
support or attend home births, so Home Birth Aotearoa
recommends that women consider this when choosing a
midwife.
Do Doctors support Home Births and are they willing to
attend if the women chooses?
The philosophy of individual General
Practitioners (GP’s) varies throughout New Zealand. Many
are supportive of the home birth option although
currently there are very few providing any maternity
care and this includes attending (home) births.
The majority of Obstetricians
(working in both the public and private sectors) are
hospital based as they specialise in providing care when
pregnancy and / or labour is complicated so rarely
attend home births.
What services do the Home Birth Associations offer?
This varies from region to region.
Please click
here to find out what your local association can
offer. Items that may be available for hire include
birth pools, birth stools, books, DVDs, etc.
Do the Home Birth Associations offer any special
equipment for hire? If so what are they and what is the
cost to couples for hire?
As above this varies from region to
region. Please
click here to find out what your local association
can offer.
What equipment or materials do the birthing couple have
to provide for a Home Birth?
Many women enjoy planning a home
birth and preparing their home for the big event! In
most cases the midwives will bring the majority of the
equipment required and will give the woman a list of any
addition equipment required. This may include items such
as:
-
waterproof mat or birthing mat
(often made by the parents themselves of an old
sheet, layers of newspaper and a waterproof layer)
-
old towels
-
soft towels to wrap the baby in
after birth
-
container for the placenta
-
bags for rubbish
-
sanitary pads
-
optional extras such as a water
birth pool, camera, music, candles, incense etc
What is the difference between home and hospital births?
Unfortunately it is impossible to
answer this question in just a few sentences! We
recommend that you click here to
view our Home Birth Information and Articles page and
learn about the many benefits of Home Birth.
