Controlled trials comparing planned hospital birth to planned home birth in selected women, assisted by an
experienced home birth practitioner, and backed up by a modern hospital system in case transfer should be necessary.
A planned home birth was defined as a birth that, at the onset of labour, was intended to occur at home with the assistance of
a home birth practitioner.
A fourth, and more compelling explanation, is that
some home birth practitioners in Australia no longer offer home birth to women at low risk.
Secondly, Australian
home birth practitioners might differ from home birth practitioners elsewhere.
Contributors: HB designed the home birth data collection, liaised with Homebirth Australia and
home birth practitioners, collected all home birth data, completed data entry, analysed data, participated in perinatal death audit, extracted birth and death data from home birth newsletters, sought additional data from perinatal data collections and death registry data, searched literature for comparable home birth studies, and cowrote the paper; she will act as guarantor for the paper.
Be sure to ask
the home birth practitioner or the people at the birth center.
All home birth practitioners, except one in 1988, supplied minimum data for births during 1985 - 8.
If you're having
a home birth your practitioner may come over earlier to check on you and make calls back and forth until you're ready for them to come for the birth.
You need to ask your birth center some important questions, just as you would a hospital or
home birth practitioner: