Second Protest & BAC's Position regarding Midwifery Ban at Pleasant Valley Hospital

On Saturday, February 20, about 40 members and supporters of the Birth Action Coalition gathered for a second time in front of St. John’s Regional Medical Center in Oxnard to protest a ban on midwifery at the hospital’s sister location, Pleasant Valley Hospital in Camarillo. St. John’s administrators continue to cite “patient safety” and availability of a NICU (neonatal intensive care unit) as the reasons for approving the policy, which prohibits certified nurse midwives (CNM) from attending births at Pleasant Valley Hospital.

It is the position of the Birth Action Coalition that all birthing women should have access to the full spectrum of birthing options, and be fully informed on all of those options. This includes the option of care provider and location for her birth. BAC is protesting to maintain access to certified nurse midwives for the childbearing women of Camarillo.

BAC is also asking St. John’s to produce records from the past 10 years showing that laboring women who are attended by certified nurse midwives have a greater need of an immediately available NICU, as compared to laboring women attended by obstetricians. All births, including those attended by CNMs, which take place at Pleasant Valley are supposed to be “low risk,” and all certified nurse midwives work in collaboration with an obstetrician. Studies have shown that there is a reduction in risk when “high risk” mothers deliver their babies at a hospital which contains a NICU(1). So how does banning midwives -- who attend only low risk births -- make it safer for laboring women?

Cesarean births continue to take place at Pleasant Valley Hospital. How is major abdominal surgery, and all the risks to mom and baby that go along with such a procedure, considered lower risk than a birth attended by a certified nurse midwife?
Please show us the numbers.

BAC believes that financial reasons are at the root of this decision. It is understandable in our current healthcare environment that hospitals are looking for creative ways to increase revenue and cut costs. It is our position that St. John’s Regional Medical Center has inappropriately named patient safety as the reason for the midwifery ban, when in fact, it is a policy aimed at increasing overall revenue to the hospital. And to be clear, we hold that there is nothing overtly wrong with a hospital making decisions to increase revenue, but we feel it is inappropriate to limit options for birthing women while making false statements regarding the safety of care provided by certified nurse midwives.

Members and supporters of the Birth Action Coalition intend to gather each month in front of St. John’s Regional Medical Center in Oxnard, until they either: reinstate the midwives at Pleasant Valley; show records of birth outcomes for CNMs and obstetricians which support their claim that it is safer for “low risk” birthing women and babies to labor in Oxnard; or retract their claim that the midwifery ban is due to patient safety.

-Kimberly Rivers,
President, BirthActionCoalition.org

1.)US Department of Health & Human Services (AHRQ, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality), Health Care Costs and Financing Researchers examine regionalization and use of expensive health technologies in neonatal intensive care. “These researchers showed that the risk of neonatal death is reduced when hospitals with no NICUs or intermediate NICUs transfer high-risk mothers to hospitals that have a regional NICU where many such babies are treated. High-risk mothers are defined as those who are expected to deliver babies weighing less than 4.2 pounds.”
http://www.ahrq.gov/research/aug02/0802RA17.htm