Yesterday afternoon, The Childbirth Connection hosted a Twitter conversation with Dr. Sarah Buckley, the author of its new report destined to become a pseudo-knowledge classic, Hormonal Physiology of Childbearing.
I tried to ask Dr. Buckley a question. The hormonal physiology of childbirth has yet to be elucidated. We don’t know why some women go into labor prematurely (and their babies die) or why some women fail to go into labor when pregnancy is threatening their life (pre-eclampsia) or the lives of their babies (postdates stillbirth). So, if no one knows how it works, how can Dr. Buckley be sure that “the hormonal physiology of childbirth nearly always works best when it is left to work at its own speed”?
She can’t, of course, so she deleted my question and blocked me as shown above.
Can you imagine the CDC deleting and banning someone who asked how we know that vaccines work? Me, neither. Legitimate healthcare providers and organizations recognize that they have an obligation to answer questions (even tough questions). But, of course, Sarah Buckley doesn’t provide healthcare; she sells natural childbirth propaganda. And The Childbirth Connection isn’t a healthcare organization; it’s a lobbying firm, always pressing for greater employment for its constituency: midwives, doulas and childbirth educators.
Natural childbirth advocates decide what to believe based on who wrote it. The imprimatur of author Dr. Sarah Buckley signals to them that they can be sure its conclusions are the same as the conclusions of all other pieces of drivel written by natural childbirth advocates: maternity care is “in crisis”; interventions are bad; midwives, doulas and childbirth educators are good; and the process of birth is more important than the outcome.
Those who are slightly less gullible, which is everyone else in the world, might wonder why The Childbirth Connection had to go so far afield to find someone to write their report. It’s ostensibly a report about the hormonal physiology of childbirth and the implications for American maternity care, yet Dr. Buckley is a New Zealand trained, non-practicing family doctor; not an obstetrician, not an endocrinologist, not from the US.
Apparently none of the usual wackaloons were available.
Not Ina May (“Sometimes I see that a husband is afraid to touch his wife’s tits because of the midwife’s presence, so I touch them, get in there and squeeze them, talk about how nice they are, and make him welcome.”) Gaskin.
Nor Michel (“[T]here is little good to come for either sex from having a man at the birth of a child.”) Odent.
No problem. Dr. Buckley is an acolyte of both … and equally wacky.
The testimonial of a midwifery professor that leads her bio inadvertently says it all:
Discovering Sarah Buckley is like being told, authoritatively, that chocolate is not only good for you, but is guaranteed to make you slim. And also beautiful.
In other words, Dr. Buckley tells natural childbirth advocates what they’ve always dreamed of hearing, even though it has no more basis in science than the claim that chocolate is guaranteed to make you slim … or beautiful.
I would have thought that Dr. Buckey’s history of nattering absolute nonsense would have given pause to the folks at The Childbirth Connection. But then I guess beggars can’t be choosers.
Dr. Buckley is best known for being a devotee of lotus birth, and waxing rhapsodic over the placenta.
What’s lotus birth? It’s the wackiest childbirth practice ever. Lotus birth is the decision to leave the placenta attached to the baby for several days until it rots off. It is a bizarre practice with no medical benefit and considerable risk, particularly the risk of massive infection. Dr. Buckley did that with 3 of her homebirth born children.
In an article written for the July/August 2005 issue of (what else?) Mothering Magazine, Buckley explained:
For the next three days we dried and salted Jacob’s placenta every 12 hours or so, then wrapped it carefully in a cloth diaper, and then in the red velvet bag I had sewn. Jacob’s “breaking forth” time—the time between his birth and the separation of his cord—was quiet and still as we honored his original wholeness …
Why did Buckley adopt this ritual which human beings never practiced until is was made up in 1974?
The relationship with the placenta does not end with its disposal, whether by ritual burial or by hospital incineration. Placental symbolism is everywhere in our culture, from the handbags that we carry—holding our money, datebooks, and other items of survival—to the soft toys that we cram into our babies’ cribs. Some believe that much of our culture’s discontent and our urge to accumulate possessions—including all of the aforementioned—come from the traumatic loss of our first possession: our placenta. And each year we honor our placenta by lighting candles on our birthday cake—in Latin, the word placenta means “flat cake.”
Jacob’s placenta has been his conduit, passing life from my body to his. Now this placenta—his womb-twin, his primal anchor—has gone back to the earth. Seven years after his birth, Jacob tells me “your placenta is like your heart;’ and I realize that he received more than physical nourishment through his placenta. Along with the oxygen, nutrients, hormones, and all the other placental gifts, Jacob also received my love, which was equally his sustenance in my womb, transmitted subtly but vitally by this amazing organ—the placenta.
But wait! There’s more in this article, Lotus birth – a Ritual for our Times:
My older children have blessed me with stories of their experiences in pregnancy and birth, and have been unanimously in favour of not cutting the cord, especially Emma who remembered the unpleasant feeling of having her cord cut (after it had stopped pulsating), which she describes as being “painful in my heart”. Zoe, at five years of age, described being attached to a “love-heart thing” in my womb and told me “When I was born, the cord went off the love-heart thing and onto there [her placenta] and then I came out.” Perhaps she remembers her placenta in utero as the source of nourishment and love.
Lotus birth has been, for us, an exquisite ritual that has enhanced the magic of the early post-natal days. I notice an integrity and self-possession with my lotus-born children, and I believe that lovingness, cohesion, attunement to Mother Nature, and trust and respect for the natural order have all been imprinted on our family by our honouring of the placenta, the Tree of Life.
Whom does Dr. Buckley credit with inspiring and influencing her ideas?
Many people inspired this article. Jeannine Parvati Baker contributed some core ideas and phrases; ecstasy in birth, ‘healing the earth, healing birth’: ‘giving birth is women’s spiritual practice’ and ‘the wound reveals the cure’, which is the canon of her Mystery school, Hygieia College. www.birthkeeper.com
Thanks also, for inspiration and ideas, to Leilah McCracken (www.birthlove.com) Michel Odent, and especially to my teacher Shivam Rachana and the women’s circle that we share in the International College of Spiritual Midwifery. www.womenofspirit.asn.au
Those are among the “thinkers” who have shaped the wacky world of Dr. Sarah Buckley.
This is who The Childbirth Connection hired to repackage their lobby campaign in scientific sounding jargon: a woman who thinks that handbags are symbolic placentas and who imputes the ills of the present day to “the traumatic loss of our first possession: our placenta.”
I guess they were desperate.
It seems there are some claims implied here, but I don’t see any evidence which backs these implied claims up. So, really, it’s just an opinion piece that bashes on somebody. If there were stats or studies to show Buckley’s ideas were incorrect or skewed, I could completely respect that. However, that isn’t the case, so I’m not taking anything away from this article.
I’m curious about something though. The question posed about the hormonal physiology of childbirth working best on it’s own. It seems that the opposite is being implied to be true. If that’s so, I’m really curious as to why someone would think this. Now, the modern medical world literally saved my life during an ectopic pregnancy, so I am grateful for doctors and all their different skill-sets. However, the role of modern medical practices with labor is not something I can support. Male doctors took over the birthing process and really made a mess of things. We’ve experienced a huge shift recently, so it’s better than it used to be, but we still have work to do.
What I’m getting at here, is that the idea of childbirth hormonal physiology needing medical intervention simply can’t be taken as true. For one thing, EDD’s are issued based on a woman’s last menstrual cycle, and it’s assumed that all women are on a 28 day ovulation cycle. Which absolutely isn’t true. In addition, the actual time of embryo implantation can fall outside the norm. So, women are being induced under the notion that their “late,” but no one knows any of the details on a woman’s menstrual cycle, nor the time of embryo implantation. So, professionals are treating a woman as if there’s something wrong with her ability to birth, but no one even knows if she’s even at 40 weeks gestation. That’s just insane!
The CDC did a report on 2013 births, and their results show a dramatic difference in the hospital versus non-hospital births. There are incredible differences in time of birth between noninduced vaginal births versus induced vaginal births. What’s most unsettling is how non-scheduled cesareans reach their peak between 5 and 6PM. Which makes you wonder how many cesareans were done out of medical necessity, and how many were done to make it home before dinner got cold.
I can respect that medical professionals want to deliver healthy babies to healthy mothers. I really can. But the pressure of lawsuits is a real bitch. And the idea that a professional can do for birth than the woman birthing… Doctors trying to fit a birth into their shift instead of allowing labor to proceed in it’s unique and varied labor-manner… That is stripping women of their natural power and abilities. I want somebody who can support me and aid me, not someone who jumps in and says “You can’t do this. I’m taking over!”
So, is Buckley someone we should listen to? I don’t know. But I do know that Buckley’s right to critique modern medical practice. We ALL should be.
http://www.cdc.gov%2Fnchs%2Fdata%2Fdatabriefs%2Fdb200.pdf
Hi ladies. I would be really interested in an actual professional critique of the report rather than all the gossip I found here. Has anyone written anything to appraise Dr Buckley’s work?
Because I wanted to find out if Dr Buckley is a medical doctor or simply a PhD, I went to her website. (She’s a psychiatrist.)
I wish I hadn’t.
I wonder if Dr Buckley blocked you from her twitter discussion because you’re an asshole?
Get a grip. You know as well as I do that she blocked me because she couldn’t answer the question.
No one in endocrinology or obstetrics even knows who Sarah Buckley is; she’s not a scientist. She’s not respected by anyone who is a scientist. She’s a business woman and lobbyist for the natural childbirth industry.
The “report” is an elaborate charade to fool the pathetically gullible such as yourself. It appears to be working on you.
Amy, she actually is highly respected by a variety of scientists, doctors, obstetricians, midwives and other birth professionals here in Canada (and otherwise). What she has done in her report is comprehensive, clear and useful for many people who do not have such a horribly negative, tunnel-visioned outlook on natural childbirth such as yourself. It is not a surprise to me at all that you would call me pathetically gullible without having any clue who I am or what I know – you are obviously the ignorant person I knew you to be. The real reason Dr Buckley blocked you is that A) you ARE an asshole, and B) she knows better than to get into petty arguments with a woman who is clearly as deluded as you are. I feel sad that you are working with women in childbirth.
Ah, my favorite parachuter: The ad hominem parachuter!
If you support Buckley’s report, please open a discussion of the merits or weaknesses of particular points. Otherwise, feel free to leave.
“she actually is highly respected by a variety of scientists, doctors, obstetricians, midwives and other birth professionals here in Canada (and otherwise).”
Like who? And what have they written in support of her?
Hey now, don’t make it seem like Canadian OBs and Midwives are quoting chapter and verse of this twit. MAYBE a few wootastic midwives here buy it, but in general Canadian medical professionals aren’t gullible fools and have no time for Dr Buckley
I know, I live in Canada too! I’ve never even heard of her here, that’s why I asked who supports her. I know for a fact none of the OB’s I work with would pay any attention to her BS. She didn’t respond, so I guess she was just pulling something out of her butt!
No, she’s not respected by anyone. She’s a nut who is a useful tool for the natural childbirth industry.
She wrote a report that is worse than useless and no one outside of the natural childbirth industry has paid any attention to it, nor should they.
She’s a psychiatrist by training. However, the stuff she peddles makes it look as though her critical thinking skills are anorexic.
Good to see we have another trenchant critic on board. Looking forward to your well reasoned, thorough and thoughtful contributions.
I might be waiting a while.
Katie, there’s an Irish saying that you may be familiar with.
“God loves a trier”.
I mean, you keep digging yourself into bigger holes, and every time you post you make yourself look worse, not better, but hey, at least you keep trying, bless your heart!
Re “the loss of our first possession, the placenta”.
Paging Dr Freud…
Etsy has many different handmade products in which mothers can fetishize the placenta. This one is my favourite: https://www.etsy.com/listing/213804706/powerful-mamas-do-it-yourself-placenta?ref=sc_1&plkey=9c7f93ae71dfaafbdaaf52a9daf28c755e530169%3A213804706&ga_search_query=placenta&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery
A little OT: Are males similarly represented in the NCB crowd, as far as non-medical advocates? I know we’ve got Drs Michel Odent and Stuart Fischbein, etc, as medical examples. But what about laymen? If there are, what is the reason? Misogyny, or plain old fear or ignorance?
“The hormonal physiology of childbirth nearly always works best when it is left to work at its own speed”, says Dr Buckley.
I was born at 28 weeks’ gestation. We don’t know why, and will probably never know. But I’m pretty sure being delivered in my parents’ car while my dad was racing to the hospital at 80mph wasn’t a case of “the hormonal physiology of childbirth nearly always works best when it is left to work at its own speed”. I ended up with a brain bleed that resulted in spastic cerebral palsy and congenital hydrocephalus.
I could be wrong.
I’m still sitting here waiting for someone to tell me how many babies Dr. Amy Tuteur(?) has delivered in her long, illustrious, expert career. Surely this person is an expert due to years of on-the-job experience, and not just some mouthy academic. Right?
Are you incapable of reading her bio in the sidebar?
OK, I just went ahead and read the “bio”, and I don’t see anywhere how many babies this “doctor” has delivered in her “career”. Can you just tell me how many babies whose births she has personally presided over? Clearly, this should be an easy answer. Link me up, because she doesn’t seem to want to respond to me herself.
She’s got a sweet man-cut, though. I wonder who her barber is.
HOW MANY BABIES HAS THIS WOMAN DELIVERED? SIMPLE QUESTION…
You cannot expect to be taken seriously when the best you’ve got is to insult someone’s haircut. I have zero knowledge of how many babies Dr. T has personally delivered but at minimum, I would venture to guess hundreds. A girlfriend of mine did a fellowship in OB and she guessed she caught 300 or more.
I was just reading through the requirements to become a licensed midwife in the state where Katie M lives and it is to observe 25 and then to act as the primary for 25. Not 25 in a week, month, or even a year. Just… 25. So yeah, you really don’t have a leg to stand on throwing numbers around. Thanks for playing though.
HOW. MANY. BABIES. HAS. DR. TEUTELS. DELIVERED.
SHE.CAN.ANSWER.YOU.HERSELF. Haha! Intimidation by ALL.CAPS. Scary!
I’m not trying to intimidate anyone, tard, I just want to know how many babies this woman has delivered, and all I’m getting is speculation from her weird sycophants. The question is such a simple one. WOW. LOL! It’s like a cult of hero worship, and hatred for anyone outside the cult in here! Will people here be nicer/more honest with me if I join the cult? Just show me who I’m supposed to hate, and I’ll do it! Just tell me about this lady’s amazing history as a medical doctor, and I’ll join, and immediately begin letting the hate flow through me!!!! I’m literally begging to be a part of this religion!
check under number three at this link: http://www.skepticalob.com/2012/11/lets-review-twelve-things-you-shouldnt-say-to-dr-amy-unless-you-want-to-appear-very-foolish.html
“I delivered thousands of babies.” -Dr. Teutel
Ok! Now we’re getting closer! Now I just want to be able to back check this claim. How long did this illustrious career of expert baby-delivering last? Where did it take place? Why did it stop? How many “thousands”? Clearly, “thousands of babies” would take decades to deliver with any degree of proper care, unless she worked at the human equivalent of a puppy mill.
“She left the practice of medicine to raise her four children.” – from the bio in the upper right that you claimed you have read, but apparently didn’t.
It doesn’t take “decades” to get thousands of babies. At 200 a year (one a day, not including weekend) it takes 10 years, right?
ONE PER DAY?? That is a PUPPY MILL. GROSS. How can she even get to know that many patients or pretend to give a shit about them at all?? That is flat out sociopathic. What dis she do? Walk in, introduce herself, yank out the kid, throw it at the lady, and head out to the next room over? Our neighbor had a midwife for their baby last year, and that lady was there at their house consulting with them every week for like 10 months straight, and every day leading up to the big day and for a few weeks after. There’s NO WAY that level of service or care was EVER given by any “doctor” that delivers that many babies. That is INSANE. That is child abuse, IMO. Humans are not puppies, weirdos. That is flat out psychotic.
Can you get to your “point” please?
He hasn’t got one.
He’s a teenage boy with no life and no girlfriend, trolling the internet, trying to rile up arguments so he can laugh instead of worrying about his raging acne.
Or someone with equivalent (im)maturity.
I assumed it was Katie Jenkins McCall or one of admirers sock-puppeting. But what do I know? We’re apparently all “tards” here.
I’m Grumpy Cat? My name is TARDAR SAUCE!
(I hate the nickname.) – Get it?
I had no life or boyfriend when I was a teenager. I will freely admit that I was a nerd/bookworm.
You had ONE neighbor give birth to ONE baby with ONE midwife. Well, you must know everything there is about midwifery, delivering babies, and how midwifery works as a whole. You are a troll and a ridiculous one at that.
Or just a busy hospital.
For pete’s sake, the hospital where we had our kids averages about 1 birth a day, so about 350 a year. And there is a second hospital in town that also has about 1 birth a day. And this is a city with about 30 000 people, so they are two relatively small hospitals. There are hospitals in the world that thousands of births. If you are an OB at one of those hospitals, it’s not hard to imagine that you are going to be seeing lots and lots of births. Especially if you are an attending, you are going to be involved with a ton.
The hospital I’m at does about 2500 births a year.
Mine does 12,000 a year. And the labor is handled by midwives unless there’s a complication. Do I win some kind of prize, or does it not count because you don’t meet the midwife until you are in active labor and they transfer care to another midwife at the end of shift?
Just curious, but are you in the US, the UK, or elsewhere? I’m in the UK, and it’s been the medical trend for some time now to have uncomplicated pregnant moms see the midwife, at the midwife-led unit, which may or may not be attached to the hospital directly. I do not know how ultrasounds are handled, however, because I’ve not yet had children.
Israel. Low risk pregnancies are handled by the woman’s regular gynecologist, and high risk by specialists. The midwives are really only there for the births (they also do fetal monitoring and birth classes), with the OBs standing by in case of an issue.
Seems quite reasonable. It sounds very similar to the UK system. (Shalom!)
I think there were 6 other women delivering at my hospital the night my youngest was born. I was the only one of my OB’s patients there, though, so I had her all to myself.
Puupy Mill? Oh geez that’s funny. It’s not like it’s the same woman giving birth every day..
The hospital where I delivered my third has about 2000 births a year. And that’s not as many as where I delivered the first two. And neither are the *big* hospitals in this metro area.
My OB usually likes his lunches free. He scheduled my rcs for lunch on his off day because, he knew my son had never spent the night at my parents house. I know the OBs at the practice I go to give a damn about all their patients.
You want your OB to do a lot of deliveries because that means they are very experienced at dealing with the possible complications that arise during birth. Doing just a handful of births a year means your skills aren’t up to date and you won’t know how to handle it if the shit hits the fan.
You’re clearly either an idiot, a troll, or both.
Or maybe you’ve just never been pregnant, or even fully understand how pregnancy works.
A pregnant woman doesn’t just up and walk into the ER when she starts labour without any kind of face-to-face care from her medical doctors during the entire nine months. There is quite a lot of care, and very specific to each mother, that happens at every step of the pregnancy. The amount of face-to-face care that occurs increases as the due date approaches, same as with any Midwife.
On the delivery day, the presiding Dr of the woman giving birth is present – as in, comes into the room, gives much needed care, monitors baby and mother, and then is performing the assistance to the birth, or ‘catching’ if you want to use that term.
The amount of MEDICAL care that a pregnant woman receives from a qualified medical professional up to and including the birth (and several months after) is actually higher than what any Midwife can offer, given she has no actual medical training.
But if you are more concerned about a pregnant woman getting chit-chat and tea from her care provider, a Midwife is the way to go.
And let’s be clear here – a dog gives birth to multiple puppies at once. If you have several pregnant dogs on a timed schedule to manage several birthings a week or month, then you have a puppy mill.
A medical professional in an area with a large populace, in a hospital that can house many pregnant women at once (separately) can very much deliver many babies in one day. And given that no one is scheduling the fertilization, gestation, and birthing of human females, on any given day any number can go into labour and birth.
And yes, that means several in a day.
Just because the medical professionals presiding over the birth circulate among many mothers, it does not mean the level of care is less. Birthing takes a great deal of time, so it is very possible, and appropriate, to preside over several births a day, without ‘yanking out the baby and moving to the next room’.
You seem to be wildly confused about how birth works, and are likening it to some sort of assembly line.
If your argument is that you think women deserve someone who is mildly, or barely, qualified to deliver a baby but who is over-qualified in giving ‘thumbs up’ type of support, back rubs, hand clapping, and other somewhat meaningless gestures — and think the father or spouse is somehow incompetent in this area — AND you want to pay for these ‘services’ then by all means, support the Midwife.
You sound like a teenage boy with your comments of ‘ew gross’ etc. If you’re not going to up the level of your argument, you might as well do your ‘research’ quietly and quit while you’re ahead….sort of.
He’s just yanking our chain, hoping to get us stirred up.
Care is delivered by a team at a hospital, not by one person. The team approach is one of the many things that makes hospital delivery safer than home delivery.
A doctor, as part of team, delivers a baby.
Not everyone needs or wants weekly contact during their pregnancy, particularly if they don’t regard it as an illness. It’s the ‘natural birth’ crowd who loudly proclaim birth doesn’t need to be medicalised, so why would weekly appointments be desirable?
You come across as flat out psychotic.
Make a sensible contribution or get back under your rock.
Perhaps his or her diatribe is merely projection.
I bet she hardly delivered any babies!
OMG she delivered WAY too many babies!
Convincing.
That’s the only think I could think walking away from this discussion yesterday. When the person asked how many babies, it was to assertain her qualifications and when the number didn’t do that, this joker decided to switch tactics and say it was too many and “gross”. What a joke, right?
You really are properly, genuinely thick. Or contrary. Or both.
Yes. Real ob/gyn’s attend 7 plus births a week. And my ob/gyn did not need to get to know the real inner spiritual me. She is my doctor, not my best friend.
I think you may need to have a re-read of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, given your complete lack of knowledge of sociopathy and psychosis. Here is a link to edify you. http://www.dsm5.org/Pages/Default.aspx
Here’s how my OB/GYN’s office works (and since I was there only a year ago, so we can be *reasonably* sure it’s still accurate.) There are 5 OB/GYNs. The docs are in the office on some days and at the hospital they partner with on other days. If I needed to see an OB when my regular guy was at the hospital or on his “weekend” (they do want their spouses to remember what they look like) I’d see one of his colleagues. So mostly I saw Dr. E, except once or twice when I saw Dr. P.
As it happened, the night my water broke, a 3rd ob was on duty. Several other women came in around the same time. It’s a busy, urban hospital. Dr. K was both professional and kind. He stayed well past his shift to see us safely delivered. (and even insisted on remaining when Dr. P came on duty and hoped to take over; I was rather glad, for I liked K better than P,) Neither hovered, nor did the newbie doc who was following K, but they were in plenty often to check on everything. I cannot imagine they were doing less for the other women down the hall. K probably supervised half a dozen deliveries that shift alone, and I got the impression it wasn’t a particularly busy night.
Did I want K or P to hold my hand throughout? No. Did I feel like I was in some sort of baby mill? Of course not! I even let my husband go to the bathroom once in a while. Sheesh.
That level of service and care is…a little creepy. If one of my care providers was at my house every single day when I was heavily pregnant, I’d be like “…go home.”
People stopped taking you seriously when you used the word “tard” (classy!), and when you yelled in ALL CAPS. I’m a little late to the party, but I could use a laugh, so I”m going to keep scrolling…
Not really. One of the OBs that I used delivers between 200 and 300 a year. One of the midwives (hospital based CNM) I used typically saw about 150 or so a year.
My hospital on the day I had my youngest had 27 births, split between the 2 attending OBs and the back up they called in. I had fantastic, personalized care with actual medical professionals, and when crap got real and I had a SD, it was resolved in seconds, In a calm, organized manner and the baby was immediately resuscitated and evaluated.
Before the quarterbacking starts, this was a completely med free birth, with no time for even a hep lock and only Ia as they had issues with the monitor and I was pushing In a position I chose.
Puppy mill? Not at all, just a mid size hospital that has a busy labor ward
“My hospital on the day I had my youngest had 27 births, split between the 2 attending OBs and the back up they called in. I had fantastic, personalized care with actual medical professionals, and when crap got real and I had a SD, it was resolved in seconds, In a calm, organized manner and the baby was immediately resuscitated and evaluated.”
Let me just say how impressed I am with that level of good workmanship under what I’m sure are heavy loads for OBs on any given day.
Great! How’s your child doing these days?
It’s a great hospital in general, my only complaint is the stupid BFI accreditation so lack of a nursery.
The baby is great, he has permanent lumps on his head from his crazy birth and a mild speech delay, but he’s alway been way too ahead of the curve for physical milestones, so no one is worried. He will be 2 in aaa few weeks.
This is really clever. I’m not just being facetious. It’s one of the cleverest workarounds for cognitive dissonance that I’ve ever seen.
If Dr. A. hasn’t delivered enough babies then she doesn’t know what she’s talking about and we shouldn’t listen to anything she says. (Even though a single birth would make her more qualified than the OP).
On the other hand, if Dr. A has delivered too many babies she’s a callous puppy mill operator not a proper doctor and we shouldn’t listen to anything she says.
Either way, she “wins” and doesn’t have to consider any alternative points of view but she *must* know which one it is or she can’t build the appropriate defenses.
“Tard”? I’m just going to go on ahead and let you sink your own ship here and be wildly entertained by the foot stomping and name calling. Carry on.
People here would be “nicer” to you if you were less offensive, stopped shouting, were more honest, and had something meaningful to contribute.
What a whiner. Go dig up her info yourself. Report back. Have fun.
I bet it’s enough to know how to scroll up to check the spelling of someone’s name before commenting.
How does one “collect old medical quackery?” Do you have a room full of teeth, large intestines, and toes? Antique vibrators? Bottles of “The Infant’s Friend,” Stanley’s snake oil, and tonics made of cocaine and urine? Electromagnetic coils? Water from Bath (although I have to admit, I am convinced that a glass of that water cured a cold I had several years ago)?
Have you read Charles Panati? I love his books.
Calm down.
It is completely irrelevant to the criticisms of the report, which is what this blog post is about. What do you think it will add to the conversation? Are you just attempting to discredit her? Wouldn’t it be more convincing to look at the issues raised rather than go off an irrelevant tangent?
I don’t care how many babies Dr Amy has delivered. For all I know Dr Amy is a 16yo boy with a pretty photo of goodness knows who and made-up bio. I do happen to know that she has raised some pretty interesting points about the report. It’s boring that you’d rather discuss Dr Amy than the points she’s raised.
MORE.THAN.YOU.
There you go with the name again
Every time someone has parachuted in to malign Dr Amy’s credentials, they think they’re doing a dandy job if they make fun of her surname. Real classy.
YOU.ARE.A.TWATBASKET.AND.I.BET.YOUR.HAIR.LOOKS.STUPID.
See? Other people can be childish too. It’s not a unique skill.
Well, she doesn’t build motorcycles, for one thing.
The more you people avoid this question, the more it makes me want to look into it. It’s funny that I was just passing by (actually found this because I collect old medical quackery, and this lady showed up in a search), only to find this rabid witch hunt going on against midwives (doctors hate midwives? who knew?), and now I’m actually getting invested in it! LOL.
I wonder what it would take to get a full history of this “doctor’s” career. Surely there’s a massive record of this expert’s incredible history.
(See what I did there? “Incredible history”? Lol.)
“I wonder what it would take to get a full history of this “doctor’s” career. Surely there’s a massive record of this expert’s incredible history.”
You could email her?
Try not be such a dick.
The usual sign of success in a profession is when you stop counting.
To paraphrase Detritus because I’m comfort reading Terry Pratchett again at the moment:
“I don’t fink dis was one of dem trolls dat trolls by accident.”
More than you?
You’re making fun of her name? What are you, eight?
He doesn’t know how to copy-paste, or at the very least, he’s lazy and won’t read the sidebar.
I don’t think “academic” is the right term for someone who has no real basis for her claims and who spends her time discounting other well respected contributors of the field.
The celebrities of the natural childbirth movement are NOT well respected contributers in any field of science. They are ignored by real scientists. Natural childbirth celebrities like Dr. Buckley are highly praised LOBBYISTS for the natural childbirth industry. There’s a big difference.
Totally OT (or on second thought, maybe not….)
The State of MN is currently taking applications for an OB to head the advisory committee for oversight of CPMs. Duties include advising the state on scope of practice, tracking quality, dealing with adverse outcomes. Any masochist OB/Gyns out there in MN? Or forward this to any you know.
Yeah, good luck with that one..
Interestingly the State of MN has recognised a problem and is seeking expert advice. I guess that’s a good sign. CPMs being unable to manage themselves at all.
How is that informed consent form going? Was that meant to be form MANA?
Minnesota is a voluntary license state for CPMs. So presumably, this advisory committee would only be able to oversee the practice of licensed midwives.
I wonder if Dr Grunebaum has some spare time?
I bet he’ll be thrilled to give them his cooperation and his malpractice insurance.
This woman is a loon and the fact that she’s a doctor is absolutely terrifying.
Why hasn’t she and (example) Aviva Romm been stripped of her medical license for advocating dangerous practices?
That’s a good question.
Drs Sears and Gordon still have their licenses, don’t they, despite their publicly anti-vaccine stances and the obvious harm coming from them? It does seem to be a bit of a failing.
Would Sarah Buckley be glad to know she has a champion of this caliber?
I imagine tears will be coming to her eyes…
Tears of what kind-happiness, despair, outrage-it’s very hard to say.
Don’t you wonder what the connection is, or what sparked this? It seems so random, out of all the topics discussed here, that she woukd latch on to this post. Helpfully elucidating, but random.
Katie seems very much into protecting her own, at whatever cost and whatever they have done, and perhaps Sarah B is somehow in that category.
Katie’s rhetorical style is certainly interesting, and the swings from victim to valkyrie are a bit dizzying, but she’s passionate about her topic (herself) that’s for sure.
For someone avowedly so keen on respecting women, she was very dismissive of Stacey who has worked so hard to get out of her difficult situation, which I felt left Katie’s slip showing just a little. Not so much about respecting women, but empowering them to be just like her.
Then again, Hermine Hayes-Kline was the same way, insisting the video with the forced episiotomy was about getting justice for the woman and then turning down the help Dr Amy offered as an expert witness and for helping find lawyer who would take the woman’s case. But Katie McCall and Hermine Hayes-Kline did a show for Birthplan radio about persecution of midwives and didn’t have any problem defending midwives who clearly have harmed or killed with their practices-seems ironic for two people who are so passionate about “human rights in childbirth”.
It’s confusing. Only certain humans have rights, clearly.
Only the people that agree with her are real people (and have rights).
Well, its clear they aren’t interested in human rights. They aren’t even interested in “women’s right to choose where/how to give birth.” They are interested in letting these midwives/birth workers break laws and do whatever they want, and then when called on it, CLAIM they do what they do for the sake of women’s rights. It’s so transparent.
Generally I feel bad for women duped by these criminals because they hide the truth well and the internet is so full of what they (the duped mothers) want to hear that the truth is easily buried. But then I see something like this and wonder: How can you not ask these questions? How can you be satisfied with “Trust birth”? I guess some people will be intent on sticking it to BigWomen’sHealthCare no matter what, but for the truly duped, how do we prevent that? Better criticial thinking skills? This really needs to start in high school–not about birth specifically,but about how to protect oneself in the age of the internet snake oil salesman.
I think that news media has a critical role to play in this type of education. When the NYT is promoting this crap, regular women don’t have much of a chance.
The whole “natural is best” trope has taken over in many areas of thought and, since it’s become part of the background noise, many don’t stop to think critically about what that means.
When we see this nonsense in our newspapers and on mainstream websites, I think we need to challenge these assumptions as much as we can. Either by commenting, writing the author, or however else we feel comfortable. It’s at least a start.
That’s why the voices of reason are working to stop anti-vaxer Tenpenny from spreading her misinformation publicly in Aus. It’s not a matter of freedom of speech, but of public safety.
Food Babe, anti-vaccination, supplements, the naturalistic fallacy gone insane (NCB a subset of that)… yes, critical evaluation of evidence is a basic survival skill.
Please note: Katie McCall left over 100 comments and Dr. Amy never once even threatened to ban her or delete her comments. That’s just one of the big differences here is that Dr. Amy never tries to shut someone up. If the shoe was on the other foot Dr. Amy wouldn’t have got more than 1 comment in before being erased from the discussion.
I suspect Dr. Amy is a follower of the “give them enough rope” school of arguing. It’s an effective method when you’re right.
I’m not familiar with this phrase; could you please explain it? Thanks in advance.
Give them enough rope and they will hang themselves, I.e. Let them talk and they will end up showing their foolishness
So true.
Ironic since she initially parachuted in with a quote by Dr. Amy about how hard it is to imagine the CDC deleting and banning questions. Btw, I do hope those comments have been screencapped in case Miss Congeniality deletes her own and tries to claim Dr. Amy did it.
“Write me! Write me! Hello? I’m here. Write me already!”
Did you all hear that? That was the Katie McCall wake up post calling out to Dr Amy.
Dr Amy, I’ll keep you to your word. Write this post already!
She already wrote to me.
Or are you wanting to say “Write ABOUT me?” Totally different meaning when you add one little word.
If so, I think she’s too busy picking on Sarah Buckley still. So many people to bully from her untouchable platform, so little time.
You’re an interesting woman Katie (I’m going to assume you’re a woman, since you use a woman’s name, but I’ve learnt from skimming your comments here you say and imply all sorts of things then take great pleasure in correcting those who make assumptions).
You avow socialist principles (the collective Sisters in Chains, you seem to claim to not own very much) but you don’t really seem like the kind of person who would identify that way politically.
Who do you trust Katie? Who is on your team? Not government, not your ‘midwife/medwife’ network-you seem keen to disavow them at every turn; not the medical professionals on whom you and your network dump your ‘didn’t trust birth enough’ cases, aka the cutters; not even the guests who go to your (not advertised to the general public but known among certain circles) B&B, who you fear will, unless carefully vetted by you, harm your children. That latter is some skill btw, I’m sure there are many evil government child protection services who would love a rock-solid way of identifying child molesters before they do their deeds.
You should talk much much more about what you believe and what you do-women sitting on the fence about homebirth will really benefit from knowing what kind of people you and your network are.
Thank you for your interest, “Who?”
I definitely don’t trust people who don’t tell me their name.
That is the first sensible thing you’ve posted. Being on this site is already doing you good, stick with it, you might just grow!
I grow from everything in my life. But unlike most of the commenters here, I do not hide behind an alias and blindly gulp down every word from my lord and savior Dr. Maime Me.
What are your thoughts on midwives who hide behind aliases? Do you trust them?
OK. You’re right. I don’t trust ANYONE I don’t know in real life. You got me on that one. 🙂
That’s not what I asked. Do you trust midwives who hide behind aliases?
Crickets
There’s lots of them on Sisters in Chains!
then why don’t you call her by her actual name, if you hate fake names so much?
There’s no e at the end of maim.
Ahhh. I must have confused it with http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=maime
Interesting insight into how you think, Katie. Stick around a read some of the disagreements on this site 🙂
While we’re all asking questions, why is Lisa Barrett on the list of sisters in chains? Part of the problem is that the laws thus far have meant that they can’t pin anything illegal on her so she’s hardly “in chains”. The other part of the problem is that the woman shows signs of being a sociopath and can be unbelievably callous and cruel.
How would midwifery cope if someone like Harold Shipman were to call themselves a midwife and start practising. What does it take for a midwife to lose support of people like Katie?
Inoculation success story?
What kind of people?
The kind of people who will show zero empathy towards a domestic abuse victim even after being made aware of it, who will throw homeschooling – fighting against Nazism reference at someone whose one grandfather spent three years in a concentration camp and after being liberated went straight to join anti-Nazi forces and their other grandfather ran away from being conscripted into Nazi army at the age of sixteen in order to fight against them, the kind of people who will be deliberately ignoring the pain of homebirth loss mothers by not being able to spare a single comment on the death of Gavin Michael at the hands of a fellow sister in chains in several hours spent here typing up a shitstorm of smartypants replies, the sick, twisted kind of people who will, on top of all that, also manage to mock non-native speakers of English language for their mistakes.
I doubt that she could ever come across as more repulsive creature even if she tried.
Exactly. All the more reason Katie should keep talking-the more she reveals herself the better for people who might just decide to keep away based on her own remarks.
As the saying goes, “She opens her mouth so often she’s bound to put her foot in it.”
“Who, on top of all that, also manage to mock non-native speakers of English language for their mistakes.”
I must have missed that as I didn’t have the chance to follow all of her replies. But I did notice that Ms Teacher wrote “headesk” repeatedly.
Godwinners are so boring. And predictable. (Not you, I meant Kate.)
Socialist? She sounds more like an extreme libertarian to me. Which explains why she thinks dead mothers and babies are a fair price to pay for not regulating midwives. And that regulating homeschooling to ensure that the children actually get an education is akin to Nazism.
A little from column A, a little from column B. She’s basically a libertarian with some collectivism (which she seems to despise in others) thrown in. Not to mention the paranoid conviction that everyone is out to hurt her children, whether by educating or assaulting them. Oh and rob her of her way of life.
I’d be very happy if she just kept it all to herself-the challenge is the showcase the internet provides.
I venture the opinion that she gives socialists a bad name.
I said just what I wanted to say, Katie. Somehow, the words “writing ABOUT Katie” didn’t want to come pageside. Just like babies who weren’t meant to come pageside. It must be because I am repelled by the idea of something being ABOUT you. You’ve already made it perfectly clear that it was all about you – not babies, not mothers, not safety, just you and your ilk.
Since it was perfectly clear that whatever “a Katie post” was, it was not “writing to Katie”, once again you made the mistake of thinking that it was all about you.
Untouchable? You’re commenting here, aren’t you?
Yes that’s a weird way of phrasing it considering Dr Amy is posting on the internet along with plenty of other people. Would Katie prefer Dr Amy to be censored?
I was just about to ask the same thing. Usually when people do not want to be challenged, the easiest thing to do is not say anything that is likely to be challenged.
I understood you perfectly. The nascent post was yearning to be fleshed out. The hard part will be which crazy to cull.
“Can you imagine the CDC deleting and banning someone who asked how we know that vaccines work? Me, neither. Legitimate healthcare providers and organizations recognize that they have an obligation to answer questions (even tough questions). But, of course, Sarah Buckley doesn’t provide healthcare; she sells natural childbirth propaganda.”
LOL. How about…
“But, of course, Amy Tuteur doesn’t provide healthcare; she sells doctor controlled childbirth propaganda.”
If you always go in looking for an argument, Amy, expect to eventually not be taken seriously. Sarah showed herself a professional by taking the high road and not even wasting everyone else’s time with biased, childish squabbles.
Oh, look, it’s Katie McCall, the unethical clown who runs “Sisters-in-Chains.”!
http://www.skepticalob.com/2012/11/baby-slaughterers-unite-and-throw-off-your-chains.html
I have a question for you, Katie.
How do you sleep at night knowing that you are supporting people who let babies die just to get their birth junkie high (and get paid for it)?
Easy. I do not support people who let babies die just to get their birth junkie high (and get paid for it).
I’m guessing these are the “hard questions” you were talking about. LOL
Of course not. Some babies just weren’t meant to live, right? Or did the mother’s not trust birth enough?
Obviously it couldn’t be because the midwives you support are dangerous, incompetent, and highly unethical….
You make me sick.
Because all babies live in the hospital. All people, actually. Heck. If everyone lived in the hospital we’d all live forever. The “disease” of “death” would be cured!
Keeping holding onto the magic “woo,” Amy.
Very few full term healthy babies die in the hospital. You know that, you just won’t admit it. In the rare case it happens, be assured that every effort was made by real medical providers. If not, there is legal recourse for the parents and poor providers get weeded out of the system.
What do lay midwives do? Blow cinnamon breath, or just stand by when a baby has no amniotic fluid, or stuck by the shoulders or have a head entrapped.
Yep. That’s exactly what they do. Actually, come to think of it, if *I* had “stood by and blown cinnamon breath” at the SD I was arrested for, it would have saved me a world of pain.
And a baby would now be dead.
Good thing I don’t like cinnamon.
I am amazed by your continuing cavalier attitude, Katie. Babies are being injured and killed because of wannabe midwives who cannot be bothered to do the work to get a real midwifery credential. Since you and your ilk refuse to carry malpractice insurance, jail is exactly where you belong. You are abhorrent.
You are incredibly ignorant of you think “letters” create skill. More magical “woo” from Dr. Maime Me groupies. And you obviously have no idea who you are talking about since most caged birth professionals DO indeed have letters. The only difference between them and the doctors who kill babies with interventions on hospitals is one group is more heavily sanctioned than the other. Typically because one supports mother’s choices while the other supports state obliteration of those choices. Cus our Lord and savior, guberment knows best what stupid women should do with their vaginas. *headesk*
No, they don’t have “letters”. They have a made up credential. There was a perfectly fine midwifery credential available – CNM – but people thought it was too haaarrrrrrdddd so they made up CPMs.
Tell us, Katie – why aren’t YOU a CNM? Why not strive for the best?
Please provide us with a SINGLE link to a healthy term baby killed directly as a result of an intervention in a hospital.
I’m not a CNM. Oh, typo?
Why aren’t YOU an OB? They have a perfectly good certification… why not do that and get REAL letters. Oh… is it too HARD?
And, you rang?
http://m.nydailynews.com/life-style/health/couple-baby-decapitated-delivery-article-1.1181731#bmb=1
I”m a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine. I prefer furry patients, thanks. I don’t dabble in human obstetrics.
^in other words, you care for patients who can’t complain about their care. That definitely removes a lot of the fear of litigation that human birth professionals of all types face.
Right. And since “midwives” aren’t birth professionals of any type, they don’t need to fear litigation.
Gods, you and your ilk basically equal human mothers and babies to Stacy’s patients, the heartless animals you are. (I am not saying that animals are heartless, Stacy. I am writing the two words next to each other, that’s all. Every word Katie writes proves how right I am.)
And yet I still carry a $1 million malpractice policy.
How much is yours?
Dumbass. Veterinarians face legal consequences all the friggin time.
The difference is, when vets get into trouble with the law, the other vets says, “That is a nasty person. They oughta be locked up.”
My wife is a vet, I know what she says. They absolutely do NOT protect incompetent people who hurt animals. In fact, she wishes she knew better ways to get rid of those clowns (there is a local guy that is a homeopath; she takes care of his trainwrecks all the time).
Speaking of my wife…as a vet, she carries more malpractice insurance than most midwives. In case she has to face litigation.
You don’t have a clue what you are talking about. In anything.
Hmm, I’m pretty sure that neither dogs nor human babies are actually capable of complaining about their care. I’m also fairly sure that their family members are.
Idiot.
That was a 28 week baby.
“Betts went into labor on March 22, just 28 weeks into what is normally a 40-week pregnancy.”
I knew you were going to pull that one up because it’s the go-to story CPMs use to smear ebil OBs. Only you’ll notice that the doctor was trying to avoid an unnecesarean. A scheduled CS would’ve prevented that tragedy. Also, that doctor has has malpractice insurance so the family will get a financial settlement. When CPMs murder or injure a baby most of the time it never makes the press and the families don’t get a fucking dime because you won’t carry malpractice insurance.
Yep… cus, contrary to popular belief MOST caged midwives don’t even have a dissatisfied or complaining family behind them.
Bullshit. They are shamed, shunned and silenced by the homebirth community. Look at the nasty comments from homebirthers on Ashley Martin’s Popsugar story and her baby didn’t even die.
The only people I see who are bullying anyone is Dr. Maime Me and her minions. I have NEVER see ANYONE write the awful things posted on this site about ANY grieving mother ANYWHERE.
Yeah, us evil, cruel people, who say things about grieving mothers like, “Her baby didn’t need to die.”
I can believe that you wouldn’t hear any of your buddies say anything like that, because it would mean you’d have to admit that the midwife fucked up.
Where have I ever said that nobody in any of the birth related fields are perfect or never mess up? I’ve never said that. The only thing I have asked is that all the birth professions face the same accountability for the same actions.
But, you probably blindly believe whatever you read from Dr. Maime Me instead of what *I* actually say.
I’m sorry, I forgot to add…”and should face consequences as a result.”
I’m actually pretty amazed. From your comments here, you seem to be admitting that all your Sisters in Chains did, in fact, violate whatever it was that got them into trouble. You just think that they don’t deserve to be punished for it.
So that gets us back to the question, to which standards are they beholden?
Nope. Not at all what I said.
“Look at the nasty comments from homebirthers”… not exactly “shamed, shunned and silenced” then are they?
Jeez, you don’t have any reading comprehension skills do you?
Oh, we know you are not a CNM. In fact, you and your “sisters” are the beat argument for why all other midwifery credentials must be abolished.
Ashley,
Here’s another one for you: http://open.salon.com/blog/amytuteurmd/2009/03/30/they_killed_my_patient_then_they_tried_to_hide_it
“Please provide us with a SINGLE link to a healthy term baby killed directly as a result of an intervention in a hospital.”
1. Maternal deaths are far rarer than infant and yet this is a mother that died as a patient of Dr. Amy in the hospital.
2. Did the “killer” go to jail?
3. I already posted a story of an infant that was brutally decapitated in the hospital. This is in addition.
The lady that died- her family got an 8 figure settlement, as a result of the ADMITTED malpractice of the anaesthesiologists. Dr Amy didn’t kill her and Dr Amy’s testimony helped her family win the settlement.
Maternal deaths are 1 in 10,000… any OB working for more than 10 years is going to have been involved in one or more maternal deaths, given that most are involved in the care of 5-10 pregnant women every working day…
If the baby you refer to is the one I think, the decapitation occurred because the OB refused to do a c-section- the correct intervention would have prevented that case, not less intervention, and the family is suing…
So did either the anesthesiologist in the maternal death case or the doctor who decapitated the baby… did either of them go to JAIL? That’s all I’m asking. Especially since Dr. Amy says that her patient was “KILLED.”
I find it odd you are so concerned if they went to jail versus the usual repercussions for malpractice… especially considering your tantrums when anyone brings up your felony conviction in connection with your own poor “care”.
That is a maternal death, not a baby, and the responsible entity paid up. So not proving what you think you’re proving and showing the responsible organisation-admittedly after some fairly obnoxious behaviour-owning up and paying up.
Do you have a point or a relevant example?
1. So maternal deaths don’t matter, only infant deaths?
2. Did the entity that “paid up” go to jail?
Where is your REMORSE. OMG. You are so callous to this family’s pain!
OK Ashley, apparently Annie wants more links. Here you go.
http://ask.superlawyers.com/new-york/birth-injury/i-had-a-normal-pregnancy-but-when-i-was-giving-birth-my-baby-swallowed-meconium-my-child-was-born-alive-but-then-died-at-the-hospital-after-birth-how-can-i-find-a-birth-trauma-lawyer-in-new-york-to-see-if-there-is-a-valid-medical-malpractice-case-and-file-a-lawsuit-for-my-child-who-passed-meconium-during-delivery-and-died-due-to-the-doctors-negligence/61b196b5-06a2-435a-884c-37c51370ad14.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-176358/Newborn-baby-died-hospital-blunder.html
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1515315/heimlicher-v-steele/
http://www.law.cornell.edu/nyctap/I04_0038.htm
http://www.jsonline.com/watchdog/watchdogreports/no-malpractice-lawyers-will-take-case-in-death-of-wisconsin-baby-b99274196z1-265035271.html
http://www.the-dispatch.com/article/20131118/News/311189999
http://www.lubinandmeyer.com/cases/baby_death.html
http://www.jvra.com/verdict_trak/article.aspx?id=186355
http://www.jvra.com/verdict_trak/article.aspx?id=183180
And here’s a long list of hospital birth malpractice resulting in brain damage (these babies didn’t die, but many on the sisters in chains list are there after an injury, not death):
http://militarymedicalmalpractice.com/success-stories/
http://www.pregnancy-information.com/page.php?aid=1163
And once again… have ANY of these individuals gone to jail or had their homes raided or their backyards dug up or their children held at gunpoint?
Were any of the Drs accused of burying babies that had died at their hands in their backyards? No.
Were any of them working out of their homes so that authorities had to raid their homes instead of their offices? No.
Were any of the Drs accused of acting illegally? No.
The whole point of being a doctor or midwife (a real one, not a CPM) is that your indemnity provides financial recompense if you harm someone and your professional bodies provide oversight.
The privelege of being a real medical professional is that you will face civil charges of malpractice or negligence where someone who did the same thing without your qualifications will face criminal charges. That privelege is earnt by hard work, study, experience and mandatory indemnity cover.
You want the privileges without earning it, without paying indemnity and without the genuine oversight of a professional body with strict standards of practice.
You cannot have it both ways.
Well said.
No one here thinks that doctors are infallible. We all make mistakes. But we have malpractice insurance to compensate those we hurt, however inadvertently. And there are automatic inquiries into many adverse outcomes.
Midwives practice without insurance and so they face a different sort of penalties. And automatic inquiries would be “statist”. If midwives would rather be treated like the rest of the medical profession, perhaps they should get malpractice insurance, institute review processes and otherwise act like professionals.
If you’d rather practice on the fringe, expect to be treated differently.
And we should simply trust that these people have skills because they or you say so??? You MUST be joking. Don’t you dare pull that “guberment” bullshit. This has ZERO to do with the goverment telling women what to do with their vaginas and everything to do with making sure that unlicensed, uneducated, unskilled, unrepentant, unregulated people aren’t lying to and victimizing families who fall for the snake oil. How about we start defending unlicensed abortion providers? How about unlicensed dental providers? Contractors must have a license, so do veterinarians, you have to have a license to operate a vehicle. Even people who cut hair are required to have a license. Why do you think that your “profession” is so freaking special that it should be exempt? I want an answer, an honest answer. and I would be willing to bet that has NOTHING to do with women having a “choice”.
Then why are more and more women choosing to birth completely unassisted?
And I didn’t ever say YOU have to trust anyone. Because, actually, what I do with my vagina is MY business. You go ahead and see your gynecologist. Just stop telling me I have to. Thank you.
Because they are duped by women like Maria Zain into thinking it’s safe. “Birth is natural” “Trust your body”.
Oh wait, Maria’s dead. At her unassisted homebirth.
And because they don’t have access to supportive care for the kinds of births they are requesting.
*dig a little deeper, dear*
Because it is women’s right to birth where ever with whoever they choose despite the risks that may go with it. But that doesn’t mean that the people who are attending her should have protection from the law when they are charging for medical services without a license.
So, just out of curiousity and since you are so keen on discussing your profession. If a birth goes south due to your negligence for one of your clients, do you carry malpractice insurance? What is your client’s recourse? Are they out of luck or can they actually get monetary compensation from you? What is the formal process for filing a a complaint? Can you have your license revoked so you are no longer eligible to practice?
I only ask because ALL of those options are available to patients of physicians or hospital based CNMs. Are they available to your clients or to clients of the rest of your “midwife” buddies?
Everyone in the United States has access to the civil courts for recourse when there is a complaint about a professional service. That isn’t some special elitist option for hospital birth consumers.
You didn’t answer my question. What is your clients recourse if they end up with a dead or damaged baby? Do YOU carry malpractice insurance? How many of the midwives you know carry it? How are the families compensated when there is demonstrated negligence?
Right. But since you don’t even own a home, the families won’t get any compensation. You are vile.
Are you drunk?
It’s hard to imagine that anyone would deliberately make as big a fool of herself as you have been doing if she were sober.
Either way, thanks for the material (and the awesome screencaps!) for a new post. Working title:
“Katie McCall, a homebirth midwife whose callousness is only exceeded by her stupidity.”
Seriously, keep replying Katie. The more hits for mothers googling your name prior to hiring you, the better.
Those who wouldn’t hire me for disagreeing with Dr. Maine Me are definitely NOT looking for a homebirth midwife. Thanks for the heads up, though!
Actually it has nothing to do with whether or not you agree with Dr. Amy. Your demeanor and attitude are completely unprofessional and you come off as snarky, self-important and frankly not very knowledgeable. I don’t think I’d personally want to hire you to do anything, let alone attend me while I was in labor. When I’m giving birth, prefer to be surrounded by people who behave professionally. I know you won’t take this to heart because you don’t seem like the sort of person who can listen to criticism and try to learn from it, but if I was on the fence about whether or not to have a homebirth your comments would give me very serious doubts about whether to give birth anywhere but in a hospital with an OB. If all midwives carry themselves the way you do, well …
Thank you for the publicity, Amy.
My pleasure! When it comes to discrediting homebirth midwives, no one holds a candle to midwives themselves. Very few do it better than you, though!
You’re not kidding. I had never come across this person before (or if I had, I had happily forgotten), and my new, fresh experience is – wow, what a stunning example of D-K. I’d feel more free to kick back and enjoy the show if people weren’t letting her near their babies.
Good thing indeed. Since it’s all about all your educated self, do you know what zero amniotic fluid means? Or should we expect a crowdsourcing on facebook like the one your guru did, with some other of your gurus giving shitty opinions?
I have no gurus. I do not worship human beings.
My bad. You just worship your religion of so called “midwifery” as evidenced by the fact that you almost never fail to appear on various sites discussiong negligent midwifery care leading to a poor outcome to jump in your high priestesses’ defense.
I think you’re confusing my religion of human liberty with the word “midwifery.”
No worries, they are commonly confused.
No one confuses anything. You’re perfectly clear in expressing your view. Your religion of human liberty translates into religion of “midwives” having the liberty to kill and maim and walk away free, an outcome you’re tripping over your feet to provide.
Yep. That’s what midwives do… “walk away free.”
*facepalm* You think you’re being sarcasic? Try this on your horrendous site, Katie. Here, we all know how things are. We also know about the active part you play at helping babykillers get free though they’re guilty as hell.
Wow. You give me so much credit. >.<
One day you will kill a baby Katie. We’re all just waiting. With your disdain for modern obstetrics and blindness to the risks that other midwives took leading to dead babies, if you see enough births, it’s inevitable.
Stick to the B&B.
Nope. No disdain for obstetrics. I love the OBs I work with. They are great surgeons.
I disdain individuals who oppose other individual’s liberties and human rights.
It is not a human right to have a woman convicted of a felony attend your homebirth.
Or any other uneducated lay midwife.
But that’s the real “Business of Being Born”…you can’t do anything else because you aren’t qualified. You said so yourself:
“while I was on probation and was restricted from my work as a midwife. Because of my felony, I was unable to find work”
Reading comprehension is a very important life skill: “BECAUSE OF MY FELONY, I was unable to find work.”
Most folks don’t hire felons… I assumed most people are aware of that? Doesn’t matter what field you’re in.
Man. And we don’t have cake to eat either. >.<
None of us here oppose individual women’s rights to choose where/how to give birth. However, I think its safe to say that we oppose untrained and unregulated people, who don’t carry malpractice insurance and do not disclose their records (maternal/perinatal mortality or morbidity, any previous or pending lawsuits, actual number of transfers, etc) to potential clients having the freedom to call themselves midwives and charge for their services. It’s basically practicing medicine wo/a license and/or committing fraud, which is not a human right for anyone.
If an individual such as yourself is to have human rights and freedom to choose where/how to give birth, while you should have the right to do so unassisted, if you WANT a birth attendant, said attendant should damn well be competent.
“They are great surgeons.” I’m sure they would appreciate you pigeon-holing them into only “cutting” and not doing much of anything else. Are you sure they love you back?
Surgery is so much more than “cutting.” How belittling.
>.<
That’s why I put “cutting” in quotes. It’s an NCB word (not mine), which I have heard used many, many times by people who are doing just what you suggest, “belittling” OBs by suggesting that all they do is surgery.
Please tell me the name of the OBs who work with you so I can contact them and confirm your story. In fact, if I find that OBs DO work with you, I will retract my accusations of incompetence. I think you are lying.
Dr. Stuart Fischbein. Dr. Robert Biter.
Not lying. What OPS do YOU work with?
“Dr. Stuart Fischbein. Dr. Robert Biter”
Well, that makes sense, at least – the 2 most well-known OBs for unethical and dangerous practices. I’m sure you guys get along just dandy. And all of you should stop offering your services to mothers, for their and their babies’ sake.
And… GROSS. You guys are “all just waiting” for a baby to die.
Absolutely disgusting.
Well you’ve given us nothing so far to prove that you’re a competent care provider.
Reading all the signs doesn’t mean we relish it, just that you have given us nothing to think that it won’t happen eventually.
I’m sorry. I forgot someone promoted an animal care provider to grand poobah of all things related to everywoman’s vagina.
Yea, we should leave that to convicted felons.
I’d rather have a vet than a CPM in L&D.
Especially since I make my living managing dystocic disasters like what Katie would show up at a hospital with. Uneducated breeders with a malpresented, obstructed bitch that gave who knows what drugs at home themselves and waited much too long before transferring.
But she does know what is required to make one competent care provider, which is what she was commenting about.
So take your ad hominem crap and shove it.
And take your attempt at forcing me to go to one provider over another and shove it. Thanks! I make decisions for my own care and I really don’t care who *you* think is best for me.
What’s disgusting is when it does happen, and it will, your response will be ‘not meant to live’, ‘what a trauma for the poor midwife’, ‘mustn’t dwell on what went wrong’, ‘if only those mean doctors hadn’t made mom so scared’, ‘some things can’t be predicted or avoided’.
Any more little platitudes I’ve left out?
Please link to where you have ever read anything I’ve written even remotely close to the words you are trying to stuff in my mouth?
Is the cause so dim and dreary for you that you must insist on making up your own stories to get outraged about.
Maybe take up gardening instead?
Shan’t, I won’t give whatever sites you do have up any traffic. I’m learning all about you reading what you do and don’t do here and by understanding the company you keep.
And it is interesting that you don’t deny ever saying or that you ever would say such things, just pop up with a little attack on me.
By your actions, and words, and choices, will you be known.
Exactly. Which is why you can’t quote me ever saying anything like that. So please stop putting other people’s words in my mouth.
Still no denial you said it or would say it, just an assertion that I can’t quote you.
Keep digging.
Burden of proof is on you, accuser.
Ok, so you addressed the SD….I’m pretty sure I remember reading about a botched laceration repair too. Was that an “emergency” that couldn’t wait for trained medical professionals?
Nope. You are mistaken. No laceration repair.
Nope, but there are a hell of a lot more who die in homebirths. Actually, I know of two intrapartum fetal demise victims and both of the mothers were being attended by uncertified homebirth midwives and I don’t know very many homebirth mothers. You know how many babies I know that have died in the hospital including being born to mothers who have GD, uterine ruptures, placental abruptions, pre-e, shoulder distocia, and other serious complications? NONE. Not a single one and I know many, many women who have given birth in the hospitals.
I hope that woman who attend homebirths without appropriate medical education or licensure DO go to jail. Last time I checked, it IS against the law to practice medicine without a license.
It was also against the law to do and not do a lot of things in history that were absolutely moral and justified.
How is that relevant? We are talking about the here and now.
Practicing medicine without proper training or a license is moral and justified? Allowing babies and mothers to die preventable deaths is a small price to pay then?
^preventable deaths.
Because Somewhereinthemiddle sees all from his/her keyboard warrior/alias position.
I will make sure to consult you personally next time a woman wants to know how her birth would go differently if she didn’t have that induction/c-section/vacuum extraction/homebirth/waterbirth/episiotomy. Got it.
What are you even blathering on about?
Since you have time to call me names, surely you have a minute to answer my question that I asked twice below. Do you or do you not carry some for of malpractice insurance for attending births? How many midwives do you know that carry that sort of insurance? What recourse do your clients have if you are negligent in their care?? What recourse do they have if their baby ends up dead or damaged in your hands?? Which professional organization can revoke your license if you have one? What, other than jail, can make sure that you (or other midwives) do not commit other acts of negligence?
The reason your “sisters in chains” are IN CHAINS is because there IS not other recourse right? There is no money, no license to take away, no malpractice to collect, no other recourse? You think that there should be nothing to compensate a family for negligence at the hands of a care provider?
Your questions are standing on an assumption: namely, that malpractice insurance makes for good care and accountability. OBs who are ACTUALLY PRACTICING will tell you their malpractice insurance binds their arms and paralyzes them in fear of frivolous litigation. And p.s. Docs keep on practicing after settling lawsuits with malpractice. That said, about half the midwives I know carry it. Some like the protection for their assets if a lawsuit were to happen and others site the low incidence of lawsuits in midwifery as a reason to not bait that fish.
As far as what recourse homebirth midwifery clients have… it’s the same as any other professional service. Civil court has a longstanding history in this country for recouping restitution for consumers who are wronged. Oddly, far less midwives are sued than doctors. And when midwives ARE sanctioned, it’s typically with an over-heavy process in comparison to their OB colleagues: criminal court.
“Which professional organization can revoke your license if you have one?” Well, Amy, obviously that would be whichever organization granted said license.
Consumer opinion is the best means for pushing forward good business practices and putting bad ones out of business.
“Sisters in Chains” is not owned by me. It is a decentralized group of midwives, nurses, mothers and doctors who have faced unequal sanction when compared to their colleagues. Nobody has ever asserted that the members are perfect. The assertion is only that they have been unequally or unfairly sanctioned, as described:
“Please note that the inclusion of a name in our list DOES NOT mean that the individual is “innocent” of any wrongdoing or “perfect” or even “good” at their profession. Sisters in Chains does not take sides in civil disagreements alleging malpractice or negligence. The names listed below are included for one or more of the following reasons only:
-The individual faced sanction in performing an action of ethical necessity in the support of a pregnant woman’s birth rights to choose where and/or with whom she gives birth. This action was performed while in opposition to current (unethical) state statute or regulation. Please visit http://www.humanrightsinchildbirth.org/ for more information on this problem in society. Sisters in Chains STRONGLY believes that a pregnant woman is the “decider” in her birth choices as to where and with whom she births her baby.
-The individual faced sanction that was disproportionate and unduly heavy when compared to mainstream birth professionals in her area (ie: she faced arrest, home raids and criminal court for an infant death while ObGyns in her area face civil court and administrative sanction).
-The individual was not given an opportunity to face her accusers in court and defend herself either because of corrupt policy or financial barriers to access to the system or both. Because of this fact, the individual suffered severe personal loss without access to her rights and was subjected to a “guilty until proven innocent” procedure which is not consistent with ethical civil or administrative policy.”
You’re saying you practice with no malpractice insurance? Do you explain to your clients that that means in the case of a bad outcome- injury or death of mom or baby- that they think is the result of your negligence, they will be unable to recoop any of the financial damages?
My grandfather could remember a time when doctors were not “required” to carry medmal and could make decisions they thought medically appropriate without the fear of litigation dictating those decisions. Very sad.
And yes, people sued doctors who were negligent back then too.
So you don’t carry malpractice insurance, and you don’t explicitly explain to your clients what that means. Do you catch breeches? Vbacs?
Yes. Malpractice disclosure is pretty standard, dear Medwife. Why do you assume I wouldn’t disclose that to a client? Some people ACTUALLY CHOOSE providers who don’t have malpractice and/or who don’t collect insurance because they feel they are going to get better service.
You didn’t answer the question.
I think that response told us about both how she talks about her lack of medmal with her clients (libertarian bullshit about how accountability and regulation ruin healthcare) and the risks she takes with her clients’ lives.
Let’s see how long her clients’ libertarian ideals last after one takes an ambulance with a dead breech stuck in her body. And no I do NOT say that callously, it is something that has happened and is certain to happen again, with the way CPMs practice.
Again, I find it very sad that so many posts on here are saying things like “we’re waiting” or “let’s see” about tragedy. It’s like you folks are hungry for them. Scary.
If I was hungry for them I’d hang out a shingle and start doing homebirths. I work pretty hard to keep babies alive, though, kinda used to it at this point.
If you don’t think a tragedy is headed your way, with the kind of clients you are not denying you care for, you are riding high on ego. Watch out or you’ll run out of states to run to.
Have I said ANYWHERE who I serve and don’t serve?
ASSume = ASS out of U and Me.
Please to stop that. Thank you! 🙂
Here’s the deal.
I think you do HBACs, breeches, and possibly multiples.
If you respond “I don’t take on those births”, that will mean you don’t attend those births.
If you don’t respond, or respond by waxing poetically about states rights or your barber-surgeon relatives, that will mean you do attend HBACs, breeches, and multiples. Then I can go ahead and send out some black helicopters to your compound. Er, B&B.
No actually, I made no assumptions about what malpractice does for quality of care. My point in asking that question is that a “midwife” can provide as substandard, negligent care as it gets and pays NO consequences if she has no license, no personal assets, and no malpractice insurance. There is no safeguard for the people who are looking to her for care. If a family is uninsured or under insured and trust their care to a negligent midwife, were are they going to get the money to care for a child suffering a brain injury for the rest of the child’s life? Where are they going to get the money to pay for the hospitalization? This happened to an aquaintence of mine, by the way. Their baby died 2 days after his birth birth by the way. They are left with empty arms and thousands of dollars to pay for the care their child recieved after their “midwife” failed to catch onto the fact that their baby was in severe distress because she was doing little or no monitoring.
So, no, this is not about quality of care. But nice stab again about making this all about the poor, abused, victimized “midwives”. This about give a damn about what happens to families that are victims of the worst kind of “care” out there. You can be sure too that the midwife SURE didn’t offer to refund the money for her (lack of) services after their baby died.
“Consumer opinion is the best means for pushing forward good business practices and putting bad ones out of business.”
I just wanted to point out here that you are refering to damaged and dead mothers and babies as “bad business practices.” DAMAGED AND DEAD mothers and babies. Perfect.
Those are not the only causes of civil suits
Oh, well that makes it all totally cool then when just *some* are damaged and dead babies and mothers. Glad we cleared that up.
Picking this apart is a fun game.
Considering the ‘three reasons’, and noting that Sisters in Chains does not take sides, despite the loud commentary about women’s rights in birth etc, which you might think are really important, we have:
*midwives supporting the ethics of a ‘right to choose’ which is not supported by legislation; if (as asserted) the pregnant woman is the decider and a midwife (say) takes away her phone when she wants to call for help, or refuses to call help for her, isn’t the midwife the problem? Why in that case would Sisters in Chains support the midwife?
*I’d be interested to know what these sanctions were-if a midwife refused to allow or help a woman to go to hospital, is the midwife depriving her of her liberty, or even kidnapping her? Again, if right to choose is the point, what is SiC’s reason for supporting the midwife? Surely a midwife denying choice offends SiC to the core?
*and then we come to my favourite bit-the vague corruption allegation, coupled with the midwife being too poor to go to cour. Join the rest of the human race honey, if you had some insurance they would be covering it for you. Some actual sympathy with this one, it can feel bad when the system seems to be set against you. Often that feeling is the result of paranoia; sometimes though it comes on when you’ve been up to something at least dodgy if not downright wicked, and is the natural and inevitable consequence of your choices. And if you’ve been true to yourself, aren’t you just another martyr in a mighty cause? Hell, those women should be proud!
Looking forward to your hairsplitting and slippery response Katie.
Recouping? How exactly? With no malpractice insurance, no lawyer will take the case! The Snyders sued anyway, paying upfront for a lawyer and won $5 million dollars for the death of their son Magnus due to incompetent midwives. Who, by the way, had already declared bankruptcy and won’t pay a dime.
Most midwives do all in their power to avoid any legal consequences – advised to put all assets in another’s name, don’t write anything down, or outright lie about what is being done if witnesses are there. Most of us have had the pleasure of reading the ebook that details the despicable strategies.
You don’t need a lawyer for a civil suit. Please link to the case you mentioned above. I’m assuming this was a class action suit?
My hospital had a perinatal death the other day. A very preterm baby whose mother had no prenatal care and was abrupting on amphetamines. You know what, the OB who did the crash section STILL felt terrible about not being able to save that baby. Moms ok, though.
That must be so hard to witness. I hope the mom is able to get some help with her addiction. Substance abuse has so many horrible consequences.
Our nursery is more like a detox unit 🙁 sometimes pregnancy will get someone to go clean and that is wonderful to see. There’s never enough resources, seems like.
So the next time you need the hospital….stay home. Please. Fall and break your arm? Stay home. Chest pain? Stay home. You might DIE in a hospital!
Yep. That’s why I make sure to NEVER transport clients. O.o
I know you’re being sarcastic, but it should tell you something that it wouldn’t surprise anyone here if that was the truth.
If hospitals are so unsafe that they can’t save the babies that start out there, why do you go running to them for help when you’re in over your head?
I never said hospitals aren’t safe.
My argument has never been all homebirth vs. all hospital birth (unlike Dr. Woo here). My argument has always been for women’s choices to be honored in both settings and for safe collaboration between those who support those choices.
So basically you think that anyone should be able to call themselves a midwife and attend births? So tell me, how many babies do you think it acceptable to die at the hands of one midwife before she shouldn’t be practicing any more? Just a rough estimate? 5? 15? 20? Who is going to keep tabs? How should parents be informed of a midwife’s death rate prior to hiring her on as a midwife? Where is that information available? Since you are such a big fan of choice, shouldn’t the parents have a choice to know exactly what they are getting when they hire a “midwife”? What is safe about knowing NOTHING about your provider because there is NO public record of malpractice cases? NO record from professional organizations? And people who do experience a loss are shamed into silence by those who say they support “choice”?
Are you even on the interwebs? Simple searches prove quite well that pregnant women are QUITE CAPABLE of voicing their disapproval of outcomes and experiences in maternity care.
Here’s a simple question: can you point us to the safety standards of homebirth midwives professional organizations or, in their absence, provide an ethical justification for having no safety standards?
Since she claims she “transports clients”, what are the standard professional homebirth guidelines for transfer of care? Or did that mean that besides the B&B, she also runs some kind of a completely unregulated taxi service for pregnant women?
Sometimes babies die in hospitals. And when they do, the other doctors go to great extents to figure out WHY that baby died, and if they find out that it was because of the incompetence of their colleagues, they do everything they can to prevent that mistake from every happening again, even if it means going after that colleague.
Which is completely opposite of what you do, is to deny that they have made any mistake and go to all extents to protect them from any consequences, to the level of blaming innocent people.
Don’t you DARE compare anything you are involved with to what happens at a hospital. There is no comparison. Hospitals aren’t perfect, but they are much better than anything else, and they are always striving to improve. You are a despicable person, and spend your time trying to protect those who harm others through their incompetence. There is no comparison.
Considering you do not even know WHAT it is that I do, I think I have every right to compare it to what goes on in the hospital.
I know exactly what you do. You are a despicable person.
“Let babies die just to get their birth junkie high”
Wait, I thought you supported Vickie Sorenson?
You could though. The sisters in chains page has a button you can click to donate to the “neediest sisters”. Considering you moved across the country and set up a crowd funding site so you could use the money for supplies to start your practice, you might be considered one of those sisters.
Lol. Wow. Some of these comments are so comical in their logical stretches.
That would have been nice but the site wasn’t around back then.
Sisters in Chains wasn’t around in 2013?
This isn’t you? https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/help-katie-mccall-get-back-to-work
The Sisters in Chains donations are for midwives currently going through the court system, facing unequal sanction in their community.
The same ones who get people to write cookbooks for fundraisers and harass their former clients who are trying to get justice through the courts? Awesome. There is whole book written by a renegade midwife and her lawyer husband about to rally the community and take on the court system when they are faced with persecution.
What exactly do you mean by unequal sanction?
Marisa, why do you insist on lumping one individual with others and saying they are all the same? Should I assume you like Starbucks because you live in Washington? So silly.
It’s not an isolated case. I didn’t realize how common the practice was until I read the book, and I didn’t realize the woman who wrote it and compiled all the suggestions did so because the problem is so wide spread. I believed what I saw in my training was unique to my situation but found out much later that it is pretty common to have “the birth community” rally a midwife who has had a bad outcome.
Oh, Marisa Bradford,
Folks who run marathons and folks who start businesses also crow fund and rally and seek advice. Not seeing how any of those things are bad.
I didn’t say that crowd funding was bad. What is wrong to rally around a home birth midwife with a bad outcome and harass the mother and her family for trying to seek justice through the legal system.
What midwife are you speaking of, Marisa?
Vicki Sorenson, Marcine Rebeck, Rowan Bailey and Brenda Newport Scarpino.
And which of them do not meet at least one of the three criteria for listing on the Sisters in Chains site?
Or do you not know what the list means?
I didn’t realize any of them were on the list, I was only naming some off the top of my head
And your assertion that *I* personally “support” them is based on what? And how do *I* personally “support” them? If you aren’t talking about Sisters in Chains which everyone but me seems to believe I own?
I don’t know why you think this is about you. I don’t know if you support them or not. You asked what midwives I was speaking of when I mentioned midwives who get community support and have fundraisers thrown in their honor and have crowd funding sites. I named some.
Oh. So you aren’t blaming me. Just a nebulous “them” for supporting some midwives you listed. OK. Got it.
Today’s post shows that you do personally support Vickie Sorenson.
http://www.skepticalob.com/2015/01/katie-jenkins-mccall-poster-child-for-the-brutal-callousness-of-homebirth-midwives.html
Yay! Thank you for the publicity Amy. I do appreciate it. Just waiting for more TWWS to expose themselves so we can send out letters. 🙂
“And your assertion that *I* personally “support” them is based on what? And how do *I* personally “support” them?”
Here’s your chance then! Prove us wrong. Personally CONDEMN their actions. If you can’t, you are tacitly in support of them, at the least.
I’m sorry, but I don’t condemn anyone. That is God’s job alone. I also don’t believe anyone in this world is innocent. Including judge and jury. The system in the United States, last I checked was “Innocent until proven guilty.” And I’m not on the jury or investigative prosecuting or defense teams nor have I been granted access to view the court records to see if I believe a fair trial took place.
Despite the attempts here to become judge and jury over peoples’ lives, it’s fascinating to me that NOBODY… NOT ONE person has shown even ONE piece of court evidence. Not one (including the good doc herself). I don’t think any of you have even looked at any of it but sit like the audience in People’s Court on TV, playing at justice with nothing but hearsay and rhetoric to go off of.
I’m not asking if they should go to hell. Just if you could ever manage to say that one single home birth midwife did something wrong leading to a baby’s death. Say, agreeing to meet a preterm mother of twins experiencing contractions at the birth center instead of at the hospital.
Funny that you’re a statist now – looking to the law and legalese. People are innocent until proven guilty IN THE EYES OF THE COURT, that doesn’t prevent others from looking at facts that haven’t been disputed and saying, perhaps telling that woman to go to the hospital would have been wise.
Oh geez. Sweetie. I don’t think you understand the first thing about liberty if you think “innocent until proven guilty” originated with Obama or something.
I don’t think there is anything wrong with someone agreeing to meet a pregnant woman in a birth center with contractions when she has a license from her state to administer medications that can stop the contractions. And then does just that. And no, I’m not talking about Vickie Sorenson so please don’t start another rumor. The fact that you think that person was Vickie, shows how little you know of the case.
Do you think by repeatedly using her name, you’re frightening anyone?
You’re laughable.
Hopefully it might. And hopefully she might consider backing off of some of the mothers she bullies through TWWS. One by one, people will be held accountable for their actions.
So you want to bully her into silence by using her name. I’m glad you’ve spelled that out. Keep talking, you just keep showing who you really are.
I’m waiting for the day you and your ilk are held accountable for their actions. One by one. Your felony conviction wasn’t enough.
Oh no. She won’t be bullied into silence. 🙂 She will find that she isn’t able to hide behind a firewall and bully defenseless families anymore. IP exists and can be searched. Even on posts about poor families torn apart back in 2012. 🙂
Crickets…..
Hey Katie,
Thanks for Sister In Chains. Otherwise I’d have to look up all of those miscreant midwives on my own, one by one. Such a labor saver!
I do hope you will giving us live, in person coverage of the ‘Rowan’ Bailey trial this spring.
Thanks for everything!
You’re very welcome Anj. I hope that you will return the favor by making a list of the ObGyn’s who are put in cages when their patient’s die in hospital. I’d appreciate it. Let me know if you need help with the hosting cost… I’m sure that will be a lot of data to upload.
…which reminds me that I need to find out if they’ve set the court date yet.
”
Bailey was free while awaiting trial under a pretrial release
agreement that included wearing an electronic monitoring device. Under
terms of the agreement, she was only allowed to leave her home if going
to work or treatment, but was caught after a GPS tracking feature in her
monitoring device revealed she had traveled to several stores Dec. 22.
She
posted the original $150,000 bond with help from online supporters in
the midwife community, a fundraising campaign that raised more than
$16,000 from donors who called Bailey a “beloved midwife” and “the true
victim.”
In a hearing in Buncombe Superior Court in January, a judge raised her bond from $150,000 to $250,000.
According
to the county detention facility’s automated phone records, Bailey was
still being in held at the facility under that $250,000 bond. There was
no scheduled release date.”
The public is still safe.
http://www.citizen-times.com/story/news/local/2014/07/25/answer-woman-midwife-murder-case-update-steebo-designs-leaves-west-asheville/13189617/
Criminal and stupid. What the hell did she think the devise was for? A snazzy piece of jewelry?
http://www.stephaniedawn.com/midwife-charged-murder-interview-babz-covington/
“Her case is due to go to trial in March 2015.”
Put in cages? I knew the government was doing that stuff to alleged terrorists, but obstetricians, too? Oh, the humanity!
I wouldn’t mind Jan Tritten in a cage for facilitating the murder of Gavin Michael. So let’s cut the crap and talk instead of murderous OB stereotypes about real baby that died a preventable death at the hands of fellow sister in chains. Care to comment?
Jan Tritten isn’t a “Sisters in Chains.”
I think, like most people who can “keyboard warrior” their way through their existence, hiding behind names like “yugaya” instead of knowing ANY of these people in real life or attending ANY of their hearings…
you are confused.
Christy Collins is.
(I’m not confused and you are, well, pathetic really.)
Considering you didn’t name her in the comment above, and instead named Jan, I rightly assumed you meant Jan.
Ok. Comment?
What we are saying is that she SHOULD be – for the role she played in Gavin Michael’s death.
Oh yeah? What role was that? I think I missed that investigation. Was that one you did yourself, in your living room?
We’re all waiting for MANA’s investigation. Oh, wait, they deleted it.
Don’t you condemn doctors and hospitals for covering up deaths?
You are confused, Stacy, we are awaiting the full public disclosure in the Sisters in Chains Ethical Practice Committee report.
Oh fucking wait.
A lot of us saw it play out in real time on Facebook before those cowards deleted it and banned everyone who brought it up. You can spew any bullshit you want but there are many witnesses and they aren’t shutting up about it. #notburiedtwice
You still aren’t answering my question. What role did Jan Tritten have in a death? That’s a pretty serious accusation there.
Well just show us where she publicly addressed what went down on HER Facebook and at HER magazine.
Oh, wait, she just deleted it. So all we have to go on is what we saw – an idiot midwife seeking Jan’s help via Facebook during a disaster midwife and Jan’s magazine covering it up.
So obstruction? Accessory to murder?
She’s provided NOTHING to absolve herself to address it in anyway, so all we have to go on is what we saw. If they prefer to sweep it under the rug, they’re going to have to deal with accusations. Perhaps they should just come out publicly and clear things up? Answer a couple of the myriad questions they deleted?
Christie Collins-the midwife who “consulted” her-IS one of the sisters in chains.
“Guilty” by conjecture and association. Our justice system has turned on its head, I presume.
I can give you the name of one OB/GYN who is disgusting, negligent creep who should be behind bars for all the damage he has done… his name is DR. ROBERT BITER.
Oh but wait…… he’s doing home births now so you totally defend him. That’s right.
Apples and oranges.
Next thing you know, she will be arguing that special needs teachers and general teaching degree holders are equally qualified to debate the dangers of pseudoscientific educational paradigms that claim to cure autism, available through your local quackityquack store from your friendly albeit completely illiterate “natural education teacher”.
Or…OMG! She might argue for the rights of families to *gasp* HOMESCHOOL!
Hey, any shit you wish to “teach” your own kids whichever way you please is your business as long it is a legal option in your country. Selling it to other vulnerable parents out there as a natural, “other way of knowing” educational practice that, unlike “the cascade of school interventions” can prevent and cure autism or dyslexia is fraud though. So try harder.
“whichever way you please is your business as long it is a legal option in your country.”
Because everyone knows guberment=ethics.
And those who hid Jews from the Nazis should have been cages because it was not “a legal option in (their) country.” *headesk*
(God, she MUST be drunk!)
Or rather, whiling the night away as she’s sitting next to the birthing pool of a mother in a homebirth she isn’t allowed to assist and practicing the art of not intervening.
Patricia called, she wants her Nazi references back.
Haha!! Love it!
Oh lawd. She is breaking out Nazi references. Awesome.
You are equating highly culturally dependent practice of homeschooling with the morality and the deeds of the righteous during Nazis? You people sure like to credit yourselves with being a benefit to the humanity in most insulting ways.
Reading comprehension. Again. *sigh*
I’m not making a comparison in individuals, I am illustrating the fact that laws are not always ethical.
Then provide some evidence that the laws you and your “sisters” break are unethical.
Reading comprehension?!
Please find
“a comparison in individuals”
in:
– culturally dependent PRACTICE
and
– MORALITY and the DEEDS of…
‘Scuse the formatting folks, but she seems to be having great trouble reading.
Ah, I see you’ve gone full Godwin. And in just over an hour. Is this a record?
The U.S. has many faults, including quite a large dose of racism, but it’s still a looong way from Nazi Germany. They may have picked up the idea of concentration camps from our harsh treatment of Native Americans and civil war prisons like Andersonville and that one in Chicago, but they certainly refined their death factories. Lynchings were terrible, but also tended to be outside the law (although law enforcement was often involved). The now-defunct black laws did not make folks who could pass as white wear special markings to identify them as black. I could go on and on. Is everything now equal and hunky-dory? no, but hopefully we’re getting better. It’s our job to hold our government of, by, and for the people to account for their actions. Not to just whine on the internet. And yes, I have been on marches to try to change things. Black lives matter, blue lives matter, and new lives matter, which is why I wanted to be in the hospital, just in case!
Godwin’s rule!
Homeschooling in the US is subject to educational standards, so, once again, you fail.
Who holds midwives to any standards? No one.
Actually, not the Free State. Our kids are left high and dry with no testing requirements or even yearly reporting.
All Katie has to do is tell the school district she’s in ONCE when her kid is 6 that she’s planning to homeschool. As long as she doesn’t move to another district, she never has to do anything again. No testing, no nothing.
God, that’s scary. What a great way for abusive parents to hide their abuse 🙁
Over here, if you move suburbs, unenrol your kid from their school (tell the to lie about the new school they’re excited about) and fail to enrol them in a new one, then you can homeschool without being registered or subject to checks. That’s how my parents got away with it.
My husband wanted to visit your B&B. I refused. No way would I give you any of my money, for birth or otherwise. Anyone that can defend midwives that kill babies is not someone I want to support in any way.
Thank you for saving us the time and trouble of refusing you. We don’t allow statists in our house. You might call the police if you disagree with our opinions. I prefer to keep my children safe.
You’re a riot.
So if your house is ever on fire, please DON’T call the fire department. Can’t have any statists around, lol.
Shoot. I don’t own a house.
Your privilege is showing, Stacy.
LOL, my privilege.
Yea, living in a house I don’t own, with furniture I don’t own with dishes I don’t own running from an abusive husband. Yea, I’m real privileged.
Anyone not purposefully trying to be an ass would just substitute “residence”, assuming you don’t live in a cardboard box.
You’re running from an abusive husband? Or are you claiming I am?
She is, You know, the person you called “privileged”
Well, if he’s abusive, I’m even more glad they didn’t try and visit!
This comment shows exactly how compassionate towards women you really are.
It shows nothing about anything I think about her and everything I think about HIM and the safety of my family. There’s a reason she doesn’t live with him either, dear.
Well one of the main reasons is that he forced me to homebirth and planned to not be present for the birth of his next child if I was going to go to a hospital. Oh, and the argument we had about you.
You’d get along swimmingly.
How does someone “force” you to homebirth?
By purposefully forgoing health insurance, only allowing me to meet with homebirth midwives, refusing to attend a hospital birth, blaming me for my miscarriage because I went to a hospital CNM…setting things up so that the ONLY option is homebirth.
See, he believes that the hospitals are filled with statists that will call CPS if you don’t vaccinate. That OBs will push you into C-sections and other interventions. That “babies die in hospitals too”.
Like I said, you’d get along great.
Like your ilk. Maybe taking away cell phones or blocking the driveway?
Well, if you’re Darby Partner, you take away Margarita Sheikh’s phone, you refuse to transport her even when she begs to go to the hospital, and you refuse to allow concerned friends to enter the house. All capped off with not knowing how to resusitate the baby when he’s born not breathing and delaying calling an ambulance so the baby dies.
Isn’t that imprisonment? How horrible. That poor mom..
Or Vickie Sorenson – preventing a mother from getting into an ambulance after her twin died.
This was fun, watching Katie think she could call Stacey’s bluff, and then watching everyone reveal their hands.
Schooled big time here. Maybe, Katie, you are as clueless as everyone is saying?
So only interventions and c-sections can be forced, yet you can’t imagine how a woman can be forced to homebirth?
I can’t see how someone could successfully call CPS or court order a forced homebirth. Nope. Sorry.
So it only counts as forcing if the government does it? It doesn’t matter what individuals force one another to do? The inside of your mind must be… unique.
So how would you describe the actions of Darby Partner or Vickie Sorenson? How were they respecting women’s autonomy?
I am sorry that your husband did this to you. I can not imagine how that felt. I hope you and your children are in a safe place and that you find a stable and comfortable home soon.
It was awful. But I’ve freed him now. He was really upset that I didn’t want to stay at Katie’s place. Now he can go. Alone. 😀
Stacy, watching you find your voice and power has been AWESOME.
It’s AWESOME on this end too. 😀
It would be really entertaining to be a fly on the wall and observe how they interact when they meet..
Way to be “with women”!
No. No dear. With woman does NOT mean I need to like her abusive ex.
Whoosh! Right over your head.
The point is you defend people who exhibit the same abusive and controlling behavior.
^says one of Dr. MAIME’S followers.
Lol!
The point is that the abuser thinks your worldview is just great….
Forced me to homebirth even! And the argument that convinced me to move out…was over Katie! Funny, funny.
Wow, Stacy. You talk about me at home and I don’t even know your name… Kinda feeling a little creeped out.
Like I said, keep posting your nonsense. Your brand of nutso is wider known than you think.
Actually, you should probably send a thank you note to her ex, because, you know, he’s a really strong supporter of yours.
Think about that for a while.
*sigh* I think y’all have run out of arguments at this point. It’s kind of laughable and sounding more like elementary school taunting than debate.
We’ve all seen this before. It’s the point where the homebirth defender realizes she’s outgunned and starts to backpedle towards the exit.
She was asked very clearly, a number of times, to talk about safety standards and recourses for women hurt by homebirth midwives. Dr T gave her another opportunity above, a nice and clear post at the top of the comments thread.
But spouting off about how her vaginal rights are being assaulted by Nazis who think birth attendants should have some sort of qualification or malpractice insurance, and using lots of ‘dears’ in order to be even more insufferable, was much more critical pre-flounce business.
She has TONS of answers for all the rest of us…but conveniently no answer for Dr. Amy’s question about safety standards.
She’s conspicuously silent now. Let’s see if she can stick the flounce.
LOLOL!! “FORCED” you to homebirth?? How the hell was that accomplished?
I’ve never been to this site, but some parts of this are hilarious. Someone chained this lady to a couch, and FORCED her to give birth on the living room floor. Either that was one evil person, or you’re a liar.
Aside from that idiocy, it’s clear that there’s a lot of feelings flying around this place, and hardly anyone exercising any logic. LOADS of ad hominems, strawmen galore, no true Scotsmans, red herrings, appeals to authority…
It’s no surprise to me that an OB would want to kill off something like midwifery (why not use government violence to kill off your business competition; this is America the Fascistic, after all). Is this Dr. Amy Teutal a paid spokesperson for some organization or labor union, or something? This reeks of propaganda/hit squad/protection racket-type stuff. Cui bono with this lady?
Speaking of which…the Dr. Amy Teutel lady…how many babies has this person actually delivered? In most manners, I rather appeal to experience than letters after a name. I’ve re-trained LOADS of college hacks in my profession with LOADS of letters after their names. Medical providers could use some of that, methinks. It was an herbalist who discovered my candida infection after 5 medi-hack MD’s failed spectacularly at figuring out what was wrong with me. The herbalist had experience under her belt and took damned good care of me. So…how much experience does this “doctor” have? Is she really even a doctor? How many babies has she brought into the world?
Jennifer Goodall, 2014: “OMG OMG OMG – My doctor is FORCING me to have a C-section!!!!!”
Except, of course, they weren’t. For all the rabid crowds of women claiming to have been “forced” to have a C-section, NONE have been forcibly held down, chained to a bed and had surgery performed.
Power and control comes in many forms, most of which are not physical.
And please, homebirth is <2% of all births. That's hardly "competition". Now for Ms. Katie McCall, homebirths are 100% of her income. Seems SHE is the one to be worried about competition.
I believe that Advocates for Pregnant Women DID document three cases where c-sections were court ordered between 1973-2005, but it’s very rare.
Actually, it has happened without a court order;
http://www.skepticalob.com/2014/05/you-cannot-perform-a-c-section-on-a-woman-without-her-consent-period.html
Difference is that there is accountability, including the possibility of compensation for damages because the hospital and physician are insured.
OK whatever, now how many babies has Doctor Amy Teutel delivered? I want to know about her battery of experience, her “expertise”.
What a logical leap. LMAO! Abusers don’t believe in the non-aggression principle. You must be really struggling to think of real arguments to support your position.
Still waiting for those safety standards, Katie.
I’m sorry… what safety standards are you referring to? Your followers are so busy throwing ad hominem arguments…
ANY!
Do.you.have.any?
Risk-out criteria? Malpractice insurance?
Anything at all?????
Here you go:
Here’s a simple question: can you point us to the safety standards of homebirth midwives professional organizations or, in their absence, provide an ethical justification for having no safety standards?
That depends on what state and what organization you are talking about. Your google works, I presume.
Any safety standards.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but it sounds like what you are saying is that homebirth is a business transaction between the homebirth midwife and her client and that safety has nothing to do with it. You seem to be saying that there’s no reason to have standards or that standards are just insupportable interference from the government.
In addition, you seem to imply that a dead baby means that the baby was meant to die, that no one was at fault and nothing can be learned from it.
If that’s not what you are saying, please clarify.
Can you explain to an observer why it is ok that in your country anyone with an high school education can call themselves a midwife after observing the same number of births I will often oversee in a week?
Why you then justify this by saying that they are just ‘letters’ when in fact ‘letters’ guarentee a regulatory body, continuous professional development, exams, and constant clinical oversight not to mention avenues for patient complaint, need to carry insurance – meaning that if patient complaint falls through patients have the ability to sue.
Why in your country you seem to feel it is ok for a midwife to have less licensing and oversight than a massage therapist or a hairdresser. This is baffling to me?
How you can continue to say babies die in hospital too – like this is some kind of an excuse – when you have never seen the extensive investigation process that occurs when a baby does die in a hospital. (And ignore the fact that the vast majority of babies that do die in hospital are preterm or congenitally malformed – it is very rare for a healthy full term baby to die during labour – and believe me when it does those investigations are exhaustive.). Perhaps the reason we don’t get felony charges are because of those ‘letters’ and oversight bodies and years of training? Because we are experts?
Why you can’t understand that the rates of homebirth deaths are so much higher in your country than anywhere else (although granted homebirth is risky anywhere, before Dr Tuetur comes and corrects me 😉 ). Is because of the fact that untrained providers like yourself feel that just because you’ve seen a few and done a few – you’ll be ok. You aren’t. Clearly. And then you wonder why you are charged with crimes.
It is baffling to me why you can’t see this?
And meanwhile – the people you should care for – mothers and babies, are harmed!
Signed – an Australian GP Obstetrician,
In “my country?” Which part of “my country?” In some states in “my country” NOBODY is allowed to call themselves a midwife.
In which states are CNM’s illegal Katie? As far as I know they can legally call themselves midwives in all 50 states.
Silly LibrarianSarah. CNMs aren’t “midwives”, they’re “medwives”. You’re only a REAL midwife if you see 40 year old GD nullips with breech twins at home, 45 minutes from a hospital and only have a high school education.
^that’s why several of the women listed on “Sisters in Chains” are/were CNMs. *.*
And why MOST are CPMs, LMs and DEMs??????
No one would EVER claim that being a CNM automatically prevents homebirth disasters. There are quacks at every level of education. But homebirth with a CNM is only twice as likely to result in a dead baby, compared to homebirth with a CPM/LM/DEM where it’s 3-8 times as likely.
Still avoiding Dr. Amy’s question????
Nope. It was already answered. I see you’ve gotten lost…
Here, I’ll repost it:
Your questions are standing on an assumption: namely, that malpractice insurance makes for good care and accountability. OBs who are ACTUALLY PRACTICING will tell you their malpractice insurance binds their arms and paralyzes them in fear of frivolous litigation. And p.s. Docs keep on practicing after settling lawsuits with malpractice. That said, about half the midwives I know carry it. Some like the protection for their assets if a lawsuit were to happen and others site the low incidence of lawsuits in midwifery as a reason to not bait that fish.
As far as what recourse homebirth midwifery clients have… it’s the same as any other professional service. Civil court has a longstanding history in this country for recouping restitution for consumers who are wronged. Oddly, far less midwives are sued than doctors. And when midwives ARE sanctioned, it’s typically with an over-heavy process in comparison to their OB colleagues: criminal court.
“Which professional organization can revoke your license if you have one?” Well, Amy, obviously that would be whichever organization granted said license.
Consumer opinion is the best means for pushing forward good business practices and putting bad ones out of business.
“Sisters in Chains” is not owned by me. It is a decentralized group of midwives, nurses, mothers and doctors who have faced unequal sanction when compared to their colleagues. Nobody has ever asserted that the members are perfect. The assertion is only that they have been unequally or unfairly sanctioned, as described:
“Please note that the inclusion of a name in our list DOES NOT mean that the individual is “innocent” of any wrongdoing or “perfect” or even “good” at their profession. Sisters in Chains does not take sides in civil disagreements alleging malpractice or negligence. The names listed below are included for one or more of the following reasons only:
-The individual faced sanction in performing an action of ethical necessity in the support of a pregnant woman’s birth rights to choose where and/or with whom she gives birth. This action was performed while in opposition to current (unethical) state statute or regulation. Please visithttp://www.humanrightsinchildb… for more information on this problem in society. Sisters in Chains STRONGLY believes that a pregnant woman is the “decider” in her birth choices as to where and with whom she births her baby.
-The individual faced sanction that was disproportionate and unduly heavy when compared to mainstream birth professionals in her area (ie: she faced arrest, home raids and criminal court for an infant death while ObGyns in her area face civil court and administrative sanction).
-The individual was not given an opportunity to face her accusers in court and defend herself either because of corrupt policy or financial barriers to access to the system or both. Because of this fact, the individual suffered severe personal loss without access to her rights and was subjected to a “guilty until proven innocent” procedure which is not consistent with ethical civil or administrative policy.”
Except there’s that pesky study that shows that neonatal mortality is DECREASED in states with homebirth malpractice insurance requirements. Seems that requiring insurance DOES make for better care and accountability.
Cool! I haven’t seen that one. Link?
PDF:
http://www.skepticalob.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Do-State-Midwifery-Laws-Matter-v1.pdf
States with MORE restrictions on homebirth midwives have a lower homebirth neonatal mortality rate.
Dr. Maime Me blog is not a research study.
Research study link please.
Reading comprehension – that’s a link to the PDF document. It just happens to be hosted on SOB. Click on it.
How do you provide “informed consent” for your clients if you aren’t aware of stuff like this?
Link please.
Well, it is a hard question.
I guess she’s avoiding it, because it’s the ugly truth. She views homebirth as a business transaction and safety standards as interference with her ability to conduct business as she chooses.
Not only did I already post the answer, Amy, I also reposted the answer. I know. It’s easy to get lost in your own site.
Here it is again:
Your questions are standing on an assumption: namely, that malpractice insurance makes for good care and accountability. OBs who are ACTUALLY PRACTICING will tell you their malpractice insurance binds their arms and paralyzes them in fear of frivolous litigation. And p.s. Docs keep on practicing after settling lawsuits with malpractice. That said, about half the midwives I know carry it. Some like the protection for their assets if a lawsuit were to happen and others site the low incidence of lawsuits in midwifery as a reason to not bait that fish.
As far as what recourse homebirth midwifery clients have… it’s the same as any other professional service. Civil court has a longstanding history in this country for recouping restitution for consumers who are wronged. Oddly, far less midwives are sued than doctors. And when midwives ARE sanctioned, it’s typically with an over-heavy process in comparison to their OB colleagues: criminal court.
“Which professional organization can revoke your license if you have one?” Well, Amy, obviously that would be whichever organization granted said license.
Consumer opinion is the best means for pushing forward good business practices and putting bad ones out of business.
“Sisters in Chains” is not owned by me. It is a decentralized group of midwives, nurses, mothers and doctors who have faced unequal sanction when compared to their colleagues. Nobody has ever asserted that the members are perfect. The assertion is only that they have been unequally or unfairly sanctioned, as described:
“Please note that the inclusion of a name in our list DOES NOT mean that the individual is “innocent” of any wrongdoing or “perfect” or even “good” at their profession. Sisters in Chains does not take sides in civil disagreements alleging malpractice or negligence. The names listed below are included for one or more of the following reasons only:
-The individual faced sanction in performing an action of ethical necessity in the support of a pregnant woman’s birth rights to choose where and/or with whom she gives birth. This action was performed while in opposition to current (unethical) state statute or regulation. Please visithttp://www.humanrightsinchildb… for more information on this problem in society. Sisters in Chains STRONGLY believes that a pregnant woman is the “decider” in her birth choices as to where and with whom she births her baby.
-The individual faced sanction that was disproportionate and unduly heavy when compared to mainstream birth professionals in her area (ie: she faced arrest, home raids and criminal court for an infant death while ObGyns in her area face civil court and administrative sanction).
-The individual was not given an opportunity to face her accusers in court and defend herself either because of corrupt policy or financial barriers to access to the system or both. Because of this fact, the individual suffered severe personal loss without access to her rights and was subjected to a “guilty until proven innocent” procedure which is not consistent with ethical civil or administrative policy.”
I said nothing about malpractice insurance. Why are you talking about malpractice insurance?
I asked you to point out the safety standards of homebirth midwives or to provide an ethical justifiation if there are no standards.
I also wrote that as far I can tell, you view the relationship between a homebirth midwife and a homebirth mother as a pure business relationship and you view any attempt to hold midwives accountable for bad outcomes as government interference.
It seems that you think that a dead baby means that the baby was “meant to die,” that no one is responsible and that nothing can be learned from it.
Can you address those points?
As for standards: For which state?
As for who is the ultimate decider of her birth location/attendant: Mother.
As for babies and death: I do not believe that all deaths (babies, adults, older people) always have someone to blame. When there is negligence or malpractice all birth attendance should have access to due process and be treated with equal severity.
Not state regulations, professional standards issued by the organizations that credential, regulate and represent homebirth midwives.
I didn’t ask you if you believe that all deaths always have someone to blame. I asked you if ANY homebirth deaths are the results of poor practice or incompetence.
If you think that the only recourse homebirth mothers should have is the legal process, than YOU are the one who is ceding regulation of homebirth midwifery to the courts. If find that rather surprising given your anti-government stance. You seem to be saying that homebirth midwives won’t regulate themselves, and loss mothers should turn to the government for redress, but then you insist that if the government attempts to provide redress (through criminal or civil legal proceedings) they have no right to do so.
Which is it? Is the government responsible for homebirth standards or is it illegitimate for the government to set homebirth standards. You can’t have it both ways.
Now you really are splitting hairs. Many states have safety standards for homebirth midwives written into their licensure regulations. And some professional organizations do as well. Are you saying non-governmental organizations are the only safety standards that count, Amy? I never pegged you as an libertarian! The safety standards each midwife works under depends on where she is working and what organization she belongs to.
As for civil court… Just because I believe a privatized voluntary system of accountability would be more efficient and less corrupt doesn’t mean I don’t know the current system works. It’s all we have. So use it. Again, I’ve never said there is perfection in any profession, I’m saying only that equal accountability is the only just response.
No, I’m not splitting hairs. I’m highlighting an important point that you would prefer to hide. You are unable to point to any safety standards created by homebirth midwifery professional organizations because there aren’t any.
And you’re still trying to have it both ways. You have just acknowledged that homebirth midwives refuse to regulate themselves. Therefore, that MUST mean that they leave it to the government to regulate them and the government uses the legal system to do so. Yet when homebirth midwives violate the laws put in place to regulate them, you cry persecution and insist that homebirth midwives can and should violate government regulations because they are unethical.
Which is it? Should homebirth midwives have safety standards that they create and enforce or should they leave it to the government? And if you believe they should leave it to the government, on what basis can you criticize the government for acting on those standards?
Or is your difficulty that you are unwiling to explicitly frame what you want which is no oversight, no responsibility, no accountability and no consequences for midwives when a baby or mother dies?
I believe organizations and local communities can set standards abs midwives can voluntarily agree to abide by them. And then ultimately, mothers can decide what kind of support they wish at their birth and choose a midwife according to the standards they prefer. Very simple, Amy.
Organizations? Local communities?
Why not homebirth midwifery organizations?
Voluntary agreement? You seems to be confused about the meaning of “standards.” They are rules, not subject to personal discretion.
I think we’ve come to the heart of the matter, Katie. You don’t want there to be any safety standards at all. You want to leave regulation up to the goverment and then cry “tyranny” when the government acts on those regulations.
There’s a word for that: it’s hypocrisy.
But it also gets to the core problem with homebirth midwifery. You and other homebirth midwives don’t want standards because you don’t want to be held accountable. You want to enjoy your birth junkie high, get some cash, and have no responsibility beyond entertaining yourself.
I get that. That’s what I’ve accused homebirth midwives of doing all along. It’s nice to have you confirm it.
*Throws down microphone* ^^^^ YUP
Amy, I get that it’s been a long time since you’ve practiced. But I’ve known several OBs who practice outside of those “standards” you speak of.
And as I’ve already mentioned to someone else, your “cause” must be so weak at this moment to have to make up your own stories to get outraged about.
You shouldn’t have to put words in my mouth and fantasize about what you want me to be saying to have a cause to fight for.
That’s the thing about standards, Katie. Some people practice outside them; like Dr. Biter, for example, and when they do, they lose their privileges and sometimes even their licenses.
My cause isn’t weak. You’re the one with the felony conviction, not me. You’re the one who was forced to give up practicing, not me. You’re the one who is hired by less than 1% of American women, not me. You’re the one with the weak cause, not me.
I stand up for the innocents who died. You stand for the guilty who, through ignorance and incompetence, let them die.
What a champion of the innocents you are! You bring mercy and comfort and compassion. A regular Mother Teresa.
And for the record, I do not have a felony conviction. You have been corrected. Here on out I believe that statement will legally be defined as libel. Just a head’s up.
Then why did you write that you were convicted of a felony?
http://nevertakeaplea.org/plea-deals/midwife-katie-mccall-didnt-take-a-plea/
Judges have this amazing ability to rewrite legal history. Watch your step, Amy.
Your own words, Katie:
“Despite testimony from the Assistant Director of one of the largest Emergency Departments in Los Angeles and a renowned OB/GYN that my actions potentially saved two lives, a jury convicted me of one felony count of practicing medicine without a license at trial.”
Reading comprehension is so lacking in Amy acolytes. It’s kind of sad. I’ve stated the fact: I do not have a felony conviction. Any further statement that I do legally constitutes libel. Just making sure you’re informed, Primary Care Doc (who needs critical thinking skills).
Maybe this should be taken down then
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/support-midwife-katie-mccall
Because if you don’t have that conviction and this is still floating around, it looks like you are saying you do
No, Marisa. I don’t have to take old things down. There is no legal premise to do so. However, if someone knowingly spreads untruths about me on the internet, that constitutes libel. I’m glad to know you are all being informed so you can avoid that. 🙂
So did you collect over $7000 claiming that you had a felony conviction when, in fact, you did not?
ETA- this was meant to go to Katie.
Gotta love Disqus! Any time there are over 200 comments, the wrong people get replied to
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/aug/19/local/la-me-midwife-convicted-20110819
So, explain this to me like I really am the idiot that you clearly take me to be. Was your conviction overturned? Or do you need to sue the LA times for libel, also?
“A jury convicted me of one felony count…”
“If you say I’m a convicted felon again I’m going to scream Libel.”
We have now officially entered Cloud Cukoo Land.
You sound just like the corrupt real estate agent I had the extreme misfortune to be saddled to in a property transaction. He thought someone disagreeing with him amounted to defamation, and threatened to sue me many times over a twenty year period for just that. Despite repeatedly giving him my card with my address on it, and my address for service being the same as the mailing address for the transaction, he never got around to it.
Pathetic, weak and (this one is used advisedly, it’s not one I often pull out), stupid.
You and he would get on like a house on fire, I’m sure.
“And for the record, I do not have a felony conviction”
Can you please explain these comments from yourself on this very site, just within the last day or two?
“BECAUSE OF MY FELONY, I was unable to find work.”
“Most folks don’t hire felons”
You have a felony/ you are a “felon”, by your own words, which means, by definition, that you have been convicted of a felony.
What does the term “standards” mean to you?
Standards are not the same as guidelines. Doctors must practice according to standards, otherwise they may be committing malpractice. Standards are generally determined through research and the collection of evidence. Things that used to be standard, like episiotomy, no longer are, because evidence showed that it wasn’t beneficial to simply do one to every laboring woman. That doesn’t mean they are never done—sometimes they are warranted.
There are standard practices for shoulder dystocia, resuscitation, hemorrhage….I’m not a doctor, so this I’m not sure of, but I think those standards are generally practiced throughout the country, perhaps with small variations depending on the hospital and personnel available. A pregnant woman could go to any OB worth her salt and know that the OB was trained to deal with whatever happens in L&D pretty much the same way that any other currently practicing OB would.
Even if homebirth midwives did agree to set standards, then why should they be allowed to follow or not follow the standards at will? How could a mother choose a midwife based even on the midwife’s personal standards, if the midwife isn’t consistent in following them? Do you really think the midwife, whose standard of care for dealing with, say, hemorrhage is nowhere near that of an OBs, is going to make that clear to a potential client? That a client is going to want less than the best practices?
Why do midwives have a choice? Because OBs have a choice. I know many OBs who practice outside the “standards” because they see they aren’t backed by evidence.
Nice try, but that wasn’t Amy M’s question.
Her question was how is a woman to make choices for her care if a midwife she is interviewing accepts no standards that are set for her, sets no standards for herself, or if she does, doesn’t reliably follow them? How would that woman know what care to expect?
And as for your little attempt at bait and switch re OBs, don’t bother.
Considering most midwives sign on to comply with standards in their communities, your question is either misinformed or purposely misleading.
What standards? You’ve been asked several times in this thread what standards you (or other CPMs) adhere to. Here’s my question:
WHAT WRITTEN STANDARD OF CARE DO YOU, KATIE, FOLLOW? Is it a state law? State CPM board? Where are these standards that you, personally, follow?
I personally follow my local state and association standards. Like every other licensed individual is required to.
Next question?
The New Hampshire state website says that the NH Midwifery Council is currently drafting rules of practice (and they’re the ones responsible for drafting the rules). The only “rule” I could find was when to report morbidity or mortality.
I couldn’t find any standards on the NH midwifery association website.
Glad to see you follow standards that don’t exist.
As for rules set by the state, I’ll link them here so all can see and play along: http://www.collegeofmidwives.org/collegeofmidwives.org/legal_legislative01/NHpracact.htm
While the legislative requirements seem reasonable, there’s still a fair amount of wiggle room. And you’ve also told us all what you think of government regulation, so forgive me for being less than completely confident that you follow these to the letter.
They have been drafted and enacted. Actually, quite a long while back.
You follow your state regulations, so you don’t attend breeches and multiples? Why the hell don’t you just say so? Say, “I follow my state licensing body’s regulations.” Do you want people to think you’re a dangerous renegade sticking it to the man every chance you get? It’s an odd reputation to try for but congratulations, you have it.
Ummmm. Isn’t that what I just said?
Oh. Wait?! So, the letters after your name don’t matter so long as you force all women who want to have breech and twins vaginally into a court ordered cesarean? So it isn’t about the training and the letters? This is just about the rights of breech and twin bearing mothers???
Do you also make sure that no women have abortions because that would be “dangerous renegade” behavior???
You are the boss of what women do with their vaginas, right? YOU set the standard?
Wow! You think that you and other midwives following state regs and not attending a breech at home is the equivalent of forcing women into court ordered cesareans?
I love how you keep trying to twist women’s rights to control their bodies into the right you THINK you have to give women the impression that your presence at their breech, twin, or vbac means they have a better shot at coming through it with a living baby. And to charge for it!
You don’t have the right to work however, whenever, wherever, and for whomever you choose. Which is a damn good thing because your judgment sucks.
^because you aren’t the one getting call after call from those mothers who are choosing to birth alone because their only other option is a surgery they are not consenting to. Explain to me how that is ok? Explain to me how a woman should be forced into a surgery she doesn’t consent to.
Right! women you’re advertising to on MDC, who are living in an echo chamber of c/s being the worst thing that could possibly happen to them and their babies, and the risk for death and disability is SO overblown, and hospitals are dangerous, and interventions are the devil… Nobody talking about the MANA data showing evidence that home breech, twins, and VBAC are great ways to end up with a dead baby. You know what, you thrive on their fear of medicine and being their savior from it, and it’s such bullshit. You’re not stupid, just deluded.
I thrive? Because I’m somehow charging them money for calls at 2am? No. I don’t make a penny off of their predicament. I apologize to them for the state they are in and for how the culture has failed to recognize their right to refuse medical interventions just like every other person. Pregnant women do NOT lose their rights because they are carrying a fetus. Your “poor babies” plea only goes so far. Do you also think women should be forced to birth babies they want to abort or have to try to abort their babies alone at home?
Thrive? No. This is not a job that pays me. Unlike Dr. Amy who makes money off of tragedies. The more I take these women’s calls, the less money I make. I wonder if you’d link me to your home phone number so I can send some of them your way? I doubt it, because you can’t bill insurance for that.
You thrive emotionally, is what I’m saying. You’re so IMPORTANT you have women calling you at 2am!
I’m not going to go into abortion here except to say I’m intensely pro choice and I do not put the well being of the fetus before their mother. If a woman doesn’t consent to surgery, no surgery, I don’t care what the circumstances are. But I’ll try to talk her into it and out of birthing at home with, say, you or one of your buddies, and if her train wreck of a birth shows up at my hospital with you involved, I’d try my best to have you held responsible.
So she can kill her fetus. She just can’t birth it at home. Got it. Very logical.
She can terminate her pregnancy and she can give birth to a dead baby at home if that’s what she wants. Doesn’t seem like that’s how homebirth loss moms interpret the situation, though. They seem to have been given the impression that their babies are at least as safe at home as in the hospital.
So get rid of all the homebirth midwives and they won’t have any choice but hospital vs. unassisted birth. That’s a great alternative, right? How on earth is that even “choice?”
You do it my way or you get nobody to help you!
That’ll lower infant mortality rates everywhere! 🙁
There are no such things as CPMs where I live. Instead we have homebirth that is provided free from the government to mothers that want it and meet a strict criteria and is backed up by the main maternity hospital. It baffles me why you would defend the CPM title unless you were earning money from it or enjoying some sort of emotional kickback from being the saviour of mothers from the dreaded hospital.
So the $1500 your client paid you doesn’t count? Or the fact you cashed their cheque and then pretended it had got ruined in the wash so they would write you another cheque? You’re a fraudster as well as a danger to pregnant women.
We don’t write “cheques” here in America. Come again?
“We don’t write “cheques” here in America. Come again?”
Oh don’t be an ass….we all know your reading comprehension is quite poor, but come on…..
It speaks volumes that this is the part of Siri’s comment you choose to respond to, and that this is how you choose to respond.
Replace ‘cheque’ with ‘check’ and re-read, then respond.
Simple.
Additionally… what is MDC?
Medwife, don’t you get it? She’s a philanthropist. She’s helping all those people we refuse to help put their lives in danger.
I wondered the same thing. When asked for regulations, Katie starts talking about state laws. However, when the state tries to crack down on someone who violates those state laws, Katie complains about them.
So she admits that she objects to the only regulations that exist. A midwife free-for-all!
“When asked for regulations, Katie starts talking about state laws.”
Ummmm. Regulations ARE enforceable state laws…
And you get upset when the state enforces those laws, and defend people who admit to breaking them.
Regulations can also come from places other than the government. Many professions are self-regulating and will revoke the license of an individual who behaves unacceptably.
And this is different in midwives, how?
Please name 3 CPMs who have had their license revoked or even censured by their professional organization.
CPM isn’t a license to practice. Are you asking about their licenses to practice?
Which you oppose.
So? You probably have some laws you disagree with. Doesn’t mean you don’t live in the real world. Or… maybe you have no opinions. I doubt that, since you’re HERE.
Only a little OT: I think it was you that talked about hairdressers and licensing. I went to have my hair done the other day and talked to the two stylists in the room about what they thought about licensing. They said that they had no problem with their being only one way to get a license (go to school, complete so many requirements, ect). They also talked about how important continuing education from a formal class is (sure your fellow stylists at the salon can show you a thing or two, but there are formal educators for things like the newest way to color, cut and style). Instead of insisting everyone used to color their hair at home and that we should go back to herbal tinctures to try and color and treat hair, hair stylists are interested in what is new and innovative. Ask about why one color might be used for some people and not others and I got a speech about the size of molecules and it was pretty scientific (and it’s just hair dye!). So my stylist (who carries insurance btw) showed more interest in licensure, proper training and continuing education than any of my preceptors for midwifery ever did.
“As for standards: For which state?”
ANY! Please, show us safety standards for ANY homebirth midwives in the US
“Not only did I already post the answer, Amy, I also reposted the answer. I know. It’s easy to get lost in your own site.”
I think you are the one who got lost…we are referring to the question on safety standards. “Google it” is not an answer. So, please, ANY safety standards for homebirth midwives in the US, or any states therein.
“And p.s. Docs keep on practicing after settling lawsuits with malpractice.”
Depends, actually. If the malpractice was grevious enough, the doc can also lose their license. Even when it’s not quite that bad, losing or settling lawsuits leads to higher medmal rates. A “bad” doctor who is sued over and over (but with nothing bad enough to cause their license to be removed) will eventually find themselves unable to pay for their insurance or unable to find a company willing to cover them – and, unlike HB midwives, they are required to have it in order to give care. So, in a practical sense, it is just one of many ways to weed out bad providers.
“OBs who are ACTUALLY PRACTICING will tell you their malpractice insurance binds their arms and paralyzes them in fear of frivolous litigation.”
I really don’t see the problem with OBs being fearful of bad outcomes and doing everything they can to avoid them. After all, no one sues for a good outcome.
You are truly a slippery snake.
They cannot serve women who want to birth outside of a hospital in all 50 states. Many of the women on the “Sisters in Chains” list are CNMs.
But they can still call themselves “midwives” and they can still practice. Midwife doesn’t necessarily mean homebirth midwife.
My bad. I assumed she meant “homebirth midwife” since she was referring to midwives with “just a highschool diploma…” which is the standard language this site uses for CPMs, of which I know not ONE who works in a hospital.
That is because CPMs can’t work in hospitals because they aren’t real midwives. Just like I can’t put on a white coat call myself a Certified Professional Oncologist and start treating cancer patients.
“Real” LOL
Here you go:
https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/no-true-scotsman
Except it’s TRUE. Can YOU practice side by side with a midwife in a hospital? Of course not. So there is a difference between you and a CNM.
Actually, I have. And do. I just don’t get paid for it when it happens
What you do unpaid is a hobby Katie, not a job.
You said “practice” not “work for pay.”
I don’t always practice midwifery for pay either. Sometimes I take clients who are unable to pay because I choose to help them.
I guess doctors and lawyers who take pro bono cases are just hobbyists too…
Doctors and lawyers who take pro bono cases are still doctors and lawyers you are still a hobbyist pretending to be a medical professional.
Right. 2=2.
Just not right now. Because.
Because they have actual training and educations? Do you not get that? That is the great thing about education. Once you have it nobody can take it away from you but you have to get it first. You can’t put on a business suit walk into a courtroom and call yourself a lawyer. You need to put in the actual work and investment in getting an education.
Yes they are just “letters.” But those letters stand for years of time and investment, of studying things that you don’t find “fun,” or “interesting” but provide you with a solid background in which you can draw upon in your practice and every day life. They stand for experts in a field vetting you and finding you worthy to have them. “Letters” are only meaningless when people like you make them up in order to make themselves feel important and playact their way into a field they have no business being a part of because they were too damn lazy or too damn stupid to go about it the right way.
But my “letters” are “fake” after 10 years of post HS education. Got it.
I guess it’s easier to practice midwifery without payment when you crowd fund for your supplies.
Oh cool, you have hospital privileges then?
She worked at a birth center with Dr Fishbien-the same one who had his license taken away.
Dr. Fischbein has never had his license revoked. Another example of the misinformation spread by this site.
Here on out, this statement will legally constitute libel. Just an FYI.
You’re right, a recommendation was made to the licensing board that his license be revoked, but instead the board recommended seven years of probation, during which time he must continue to see all female patients with a chaperone and receive counselling.
He must notify all employers and insurers of these conditions on his practice.
He plead guilty (no contest) to the misdemeanour of having sex with a patient.
Just so we’re absolutely clear.
He’s still got a licence, but everything indicates he is a sexual predator with very poor ethical judgement and the board doesn’t trust him to be alone with female patients under any circumstances.
Dr Fishbein is the ultimate sleazebag, and if he hasn’t had his licence revoked, it doesn’t mean he’s not an abuser and a liar.
Then why care about licenses? If they don’t protect us from immoral individuals, why look to their authorities?
Because licenses are meant to ensure a basic level of education and training. Not all of the immoral or unethical are weeded out before they make it into practice – they still have the required knowledge and experience, which is what the license stands for. There are things put into place to try and weed out those who show unethical practices – just as happened to your “collegue” Dr. Fischbein, though I’d prefer his license had been taken away, not just 7 years probation.
So you are saying that we should let these Certified Professional Oncologist go around a treat cancer patients? By the way, the “certification process” is giving me 20 bucks? Would you like a Certified Professional Oncologist to treat you or your loved ones? I mean people who see oncologists with actual training and education die of cancer all the time. I mean why bother licensing medical professionals at all? I am now PlasticSurgeonSarah and I’ll be fixing your child’s cleft lip today.
Yep. Because babies are tumors that need to be “healed.”
Sorry, hate to break it to you… but most babies will come out just fine on their own if nobody is around. Birth is pretty darn normal most of the time. But when it isn’t, and when we are sick and unhealthy and need TREATMENT, that’s when we go to a doctor.
So you disavow preventive medicine. Wait until there’s an emergency, THEN intervene. Why bother trying to PREVENT it.
^is that a real question? Wow.
Why prevent forest fires when you can put them out? >.<
That’s exactly what you just advocated. (paraphrase) “Birth goes right most of the time. When there’s a problem, THEN you go to the doctor.”
How about PREVENTING forest fires, not waiting until there is one to put it out?
By staffing firefighters on every corner? C’mon now.
Should we just all live in the hospital because someone MIGHT get sick some day?
No, by determining beforehand which towns/fields/forests are at increased risk of sparking a fire, by clearing brush BEFORE a fire, by having trucks/water/planes on standby.
You would wait until things are raging out of control, then call in help.
You said yourself, things only go well in birth “most” of the time.
Yes! And hour long, holistic midwifery PN appointments do so much more in prevention than 4 minute OB PN appointments! Imagine if we worked together! 🙂
“Yes! And hour long, holistic midwifery PN appointments do so much more in prevention than 4 minute OB PN appointments! ”
Oh please, do tell. What specific complication(s) can be prevented by these looooong “holistic” prenatal apts. that can’t be prevented by regular prenatal apts with an OB, and how?
I want to know where there are 4 minute appointments. Even my phonecall from an Ob/Gyn about my blood test results took longer than that.
Better to compare babies to poop, huh? That’s what midwife patron saint Ina May implies. That’s what homebirther advocates imply by comparing obstructed labour to taking a dump and think they’re both harder when a person is scared. Blissfully unaware that at being scared shitless, defecating is a natural bodily response.
Well they have been compared to poop so often by your counterparts I’d say a tumor would be a step up.
Did you get a crystal ball with your fake certification that tells you which babies will come out just fine and which won’t. You sure don’t get the training and skills to tell the difference with what is basically a correspondence course and watching a few births. And just hoping that the numbers are on your side each time would be grossly irresponsible so let’s see that crystal ball Katie.
Wouldn’t that be handy. If such a thing existed, I’m sure OBs would have it!
It’s a good thing they don’t right? Then you and your counterparts can’t bemoan all the “unnecessary c-sections/inductions/etc.”
Yes indeed! And everyone would know FOR SURE what would have “happened if.”
Who wouldn’t want to know without fear of error what’s going to have a good outcome and what isn’t?
The only people who seem to claim that birth is always safe and to be trusted are homebirth midwives, some of whom are making money out of it, some of whom are birth hobbyists, and some who are a little of both.
People who do know all about it ie OBs make no promises and do what they can to get successful outcomes ie everyone alive and with all their brain cells intact.
“Most babies will come out just fine on their own if nobody is around. Birth is pretty darn normal most of the time.”
Your privilege is showing. Come with me to Malawi in a few months and let’s see how well your statement goes over with all of the women I’ll meet who gave birth with nobody around.
Which just goes to show how utterly useless the CPM is. Usually they aren’t needed, and if help IS needed, they can’t do a damn thing. But be sure to pay in full before things hit the fan!
Note that