The information on this page has been kindly supplied by Lareen Newman BA(Hons) PhD, Tania Smallwood BMid RM (both of Maternity Coalition and Homebirth Network SA) and Justine Caines (Homebirth Australia)
The idea of "homebirth" often conjures up fear in the minds of many women in Australia who tend to associate it with being "risky" and with not being able to have pain relief. However, increasing numbers of women are choosing homebirth when they find out how much more in control women feel when they birth at home, or when they discover the increasing amount of medical research which shows that homebirth is as safe as hospital birth for a woman at low risk of complications who is attended by an experienced professional midwife, and who lives within reasonable distance of a back-up hospital. Research shows that the risk of the mother or baby being injured or dying at a homebirth under these criteria are usually the same as (if not lower than) if they were in hospital.
The information on this page has been kindly supplied by Lareen Newman BA(Hons) PhD, Tania Smallwood BMid RM (both of Maternity Coalition and Homebirth Network SA) and Justine Caines (Homebirth Australia)
