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PS From Penny Simkin
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January 19, 2010
Volume 2, Number 1
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Greetings!
I hope this New Year finds you well, happy, and full of commitment to continue the good work of improving birth here and everywhere!
2010 marks 42 years in this field for me! Yikes! And to think I got into it because I wanted a part time job that would allow me to be at home during the day with my children. Childbirth education met that need. I had no idea how much satisfaction I would find in this work! This issue of "PS from Penny Simkin" lets you know about some aspects of childbirth work that keep me fascinated.
I hope you enjoy it.
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My trip to Israel and India...
My husband and I traveled to Israel and India in late Oct. and most of November, where we enjoyed a blend of work and play.
 In Jerusalem, I addressed an audience of 300 professionals about the impact of sexual abuse on pregnant and birthing women. Click here to read an article covering my presentation in the Jersalem Post. I also gave a doula training for 40 dedicated doulas in Jerusalem.
We then traveled to India, where our son and daughter-in-law live in Chennai (formerly Madras). Of course, they were the main reason for our visit, but they found plenty of opportunities for us to follow our professional interests as well. Click here for an article about me in the Times of India.
I somehow found myself promoting a new book (Passport to a Healthy Pregnancy) by one of India's leading obstetricians, Dr. Gita Arjun. (The picture shows us at a bookstore speaking to the public). Birth in India is beset by complicating factors, among them, grinding poverty, a terrible shortage of doctors, midwives, and nurses, and some harmful cultural customs, including overfeeding pregnant women, then depriving them of food and drink during labor and postpartum. Episiotomies are routine.
On one ward that I toured, there were two nurses on the 14 bed ward. In the one birth I attended on that ward, the woman had an episiotomy and a 45 minute repair. There were 3 or 4 doctors, students or nurses there that whole time. I thought, "In a resource poor country like this, what a waste of human resources (to say nothing of suture material!) it takes to preserve a completely unnecessary operation." Meanwhile, the other nurses were running around crazily trying to take care of everyone. I made that observation in some of my talks, and much to my glee, after we came home, I was excited to receive an email from an Indian doula who wrote to let me know of a recent birth she attended where the obstetrician chose not to perform an episiotomy because of what he learned at my talk. The woman needed no stitches!
Despite some of the unpleasant realities that I witnessed, I love India!
The people whom we met are dedicated to improving the lives of the least empowered among us.
The doctors in all the medical specialties work hard for long hours, sometimes with few supplies and always lots of patients. They are devoted to their work and to the improvement of their patients' lives. The spirituality of the people and their kindness was moving.
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The Fetal Occiput Posterior Position: The State of the Science and Call for a New Perspective
 If you have access to "Birth: Issues in Perinatal Care" 37(1), which will be available in March, you might be interested in my article with the same title as the title of this item. After noting for a long time that there are many inconsistencies between our beliefs about the O.P. fetus and the findings reported in numerous recent scientific research reports as well as the clinical observations of many maternity care providers, I finally bit the bullet and conducted literature searches on many of these inconsistencies (some of you may have attended my conference presentations on the topic, "The O.P. Fetus: How Little We Know").
In this paper I review the literature on many common beliefs about the O.P. fetus: back pain in labor means the fetus is O.P.; turning a baby to O.A. before labor ensures an O.A. baby at birth; caregivers are skilled in detecting the O.P. fetus; etc.
I'm afraid my findings will either confirm what some of you think, relieve those of you who are as perplexed as I, and anger those of you who feel confident about preventing, detecting, and correcting an O.P. fetus.
I'd love some feedback from you about my findings. There is no free access to the journal article, except if you request it directly from me by sending an email request here. I can send you a copy once it has been published.
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Please Support MAMA
After more
than 30 years helping to prepare direct entry midwives to provide top-notch
safe, satisfying and cost-effective maternity care, I am excited that the
soon-to-become health care reform legislation represents an opportunity to
ensure that the Certified Professional Midwife (CPM) will be available to
provide care for Medicaid recipients who, at the moment, have little or no
access to such care.
I
wholeheartedly support this effort and am pledging $200. I ask you to give
whatever you can to ensure that more women have access to cost-effective,
quality maternity care.
Click here to donate>
Click here to go to my web site to read about MAMA and why I'm supporting the effort to ensure that all women have access to care by a CPM>
Thank you!
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Delayed Cord Clamping - Join the Discussion
It is becoming very clear that delaying cord clamping has real
advantages for the baby (and possibly for the mother, but, at this time
the science is not as clear on advantages for the mother). I've posted a discussion on this topic on my Facebook page. Please click here and join the discussion!
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Upcoming Workshops with Penny
Simkin Center for Allied Birth
Vocations, When Survivors Give Birth
02.5-6.2010, Bothell, WA
Two days with Penny Simkin exploring how
to improve the childbearing experiences of women with histories of
abuse.
Conference Details
CIMS,
2010 Mother-Friendly Childbirth Forum & Annual Meeting
02.26-27.2010, Austin, TX
Penny will be presenting on Eco-Friendly
Birth.
Conference Details
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Popular Products from Penny
 The Birth Partner, Third Edition: A Complete Guide to Childbirth for Dads, Doulas, and All Other Labor Companions
"My
husband's gift to me at the end of each pregnancy is to read "The Birth
Partner." Every woman I come across that is having a baby gets an
earful from me about how ESSENTIAL this book is for them to read." - Shalome Wilson, mother of 4, Seattle, WA
Details and ordering information>
Relaxation, Rhythm and Ritual: The 3Rs of Childbirth (DVD)Details and ordering information> |
Comfort Measures
A Special Note to Those With Institutional Affiliation or Lending Libraries
 We appreciate all the great feedback from those of you who have purchased our new Comfort Measures for Childbirth DVD. If you are an educator, a nurse, a doula or midwife interested in quantity discounts for your institution or lending library, call us at 206.325.1419 or send us an email for information. We are interested in making this excellent resource available to more childbearing families.
Click here to watch the trailer with scenes from the DVD and comments from an expectant mom and a doula.
Click here to watch a brief video about why Penny made "Comfort Measures" including a discussion of pain and "when pain becomes suffering."
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The Labor Progress Handbook
"This little text, which will fit nicely in a back pocket* or 'lab coat', provides practical diagrams of normal and abnormal fetal positions that can be identified well before labor, and more importantly, corrected, so as to lessen the malpositions of labor that unleash the 'cascade' of interventions that characterize the experience of so many women having their first babies. It will take much to turn society back from thinking of childbirth as an accident waiting to happen and to help women realize their power and competence, but the authors have given us a tool to help in that process, to help us keep normal birth normal. I am grateful that this book is available and entering its second edition."~Michael Klein, MD, University of British Columbia
*"It fits perfectly into any home birth midwife's birth bag, too!" - Lynn, newsletter editor & midwife
Buy one now for yourself and one for your favorite nurse, doula, midwife or OB!
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Call For Anthology Contributions
For an anthology about doulas and doula-supported birth
Editor seeks true, first-person accounts from moms, dads, midwives, docs, nurses, doulas, and others with strong writing skills. Accounts can also relate to pre and/or post-natal support. What did you experience, observe, feel, learn, reflect upon? How were you moved, changed by the experience of having or working with a doula? What can you share with prospective parents, reluctant practitioners, passionate advocates? Send double-spaced MSWord attachment (Times New Roman, 12 pt.) - 3000 word max - + 50 word bio and complete contact information by 3/15 to Elayne Clift. |
For my new readers and those who joined my list from the start, I invite you to visit my website. Many of my presentations and handouts are posted there for you to download, and my presentation schedule is also posted there. If I come to your area to speak, please come and see me, and let me know you're on my newsletter list. I hope to keep in touch with you informally on maternity care topics that mean the most to me.
I'd love your feedback.
All the best,
Penny
PS Click here to visit us on Facebook
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