Birth

Imagine waddling up to the desk at the maternity ward, labour in full swing. The masked midwife offers you a choice of Room One or Two. They are identical rooms, staffed by the same care team, and you are allowed one support person regardless of which room you choose.

Choose Room Two, she tells you, and your labour will be on average 41 minutes shorter than in Room One. You’ll be 31% less likely to need drugs to speed up your labour and 28% less likely to deliver via caesarean. You’ll also be…

Today Western Sydney University Professor of Midwifery Hannah Dahlen posed two questions of her social media audience in response to 2021 update of the “Australia’s Mothers and Babies” report, released by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare last week.

The first question, “what the hell are we doing?”, comes on the back of the following 2019 statistics from the publication last week.

As of 2019, Australia’s caesarean birth rate is now 36% (and 37% for first time mothers and birth par…

Below is the transcript of the video and audio research update I recorded on 10th Sept 2021 on the topic of pregnancy and vaccination against COVID-19. This information is information only, and does not take the place of individualised advice and consultation with your medical team. I hope you find this useful, and please feel free to share this resource with anyone you think might be interested.

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Hello my name is Anna Cusack, I am an author, a doula, Certified Motherhood Studies Practition…

My empowered home birth was a reflection of my inner work and outer advocacy, but also relied upon my white privilege.

To access a publicly-funded homebirth service is rare in Australia.

You need to be located within striking distance to hospital. ABS data from 2019 tells us that only 10% of non-Indigenous people live outside major city and inner regional areas, while 39% of Indigenous people live outside these zones.

You need to be a “low risk pregnancy”. Because I am a white Australian, I haven’t…