Concerns about education or training are more fear, than fact

Last month, Gov. John Baldacci signed a new law to benefit Maine families choosing to birth their babies at home.

LD 2253, An Act to Provide Access to Certain Medications to Certified Midwives, authorizes certified professional midwives (CPMs) in Maine to possess and administer five specific medications used in midwifery.

LD 2253 was originally titled “An Act to License Certified Professional Midwives.” It was brought forward by the Maine Association of Certified Professional Midwives to address safety issues that could result from the lack of legal access to certain medications. It was also proposed to create a system of regulation and accountability under the Complementary Health Care Board.

Since the original bill was proposed more than a year ago, the education and training of midwives has been under attack. This seems to be more a case of xenophobia, than concern for the safety of mothers and babies. The Maine Department of Professional and Financial Regulation assessed our education and recommended against licensing, essentially because they found our education to be adequate and could find no risk to public safety.

The Legislature’s Business, Research and Economic Development – BRED – Committee reviewed our education thoroughly, and listened to testimony from certified professional midwives, mothers, physicians, and nurses. Every member of this committee voted either to recommend licensing or to recommend certified professional midwives have legal access to medications. They clearly found our education to be satisfactory.

When it became clear the BRED Committee supported access to medications, the amended version of the bill was introduced, which allowed legal access to five medications, but not licensing. This controversial version was the brainchild of the Maine Medical Association, not the Maine Association of Certified Professional Midwives.

Despite this, several members of the medical community have publicly accused certified professional midwives of not knowing how to properly use the medications covered in the new law. In order to receive certification, certified professional midwives must demonstrate they understand the benefits and risks of medications used in the practice of midwifery, as well as their appropriate use and how to administer them.

Certified professional midwives are not trying to intrude on medical practice. In fact, many of our clients choose home birth specifically to avoid the medical interventions commonplace in hospitals. Our clients include nurses and doctors, as well as members of many other professions.

Home births account for one percent of births in Maine. Certified professional midwives are the only practitioners in Maine to attend home births, and the only maternal care providers specifically trained to attend out-of-hospital birth. The safety and excellent outcomes of certified professional midwives are well documented.

Research has shown that, for healthy women, having a planned home birth attended by a certified professional midwife is as safe as – or even safer than – hospital birth. Furthermore, there is less risk of practices and routines that jeopardize the health of mothers and babies, such as inducing or augmenting labor, using continuous electronic fetal monitoring, and separating newborns from their mothers.

The medications covered by the law include several that are potentially life-saving, as well as eye prophylaxis, which is required by state law for newborns. Providing certified professional midwives with legal access to these medications can only improve the birth experience for those women choosing home birth in Maine.

This bill assures families that the choice to give birth at home is as safe as possible.

Who in good conscience could oppose this?

Holly Arends, of Bath, and Susi Delaney, of Gray, are certified professional midwives and members of the Maine Association of Certified Professional Midwives.