The rumour is that Nicole checked herself in to the hospital to have the baby. This could be totally bogus, but we have to report it. I hope this isn’t going to be like when Angelina was going to deliver the twins.

No, there aren’t any pictures to prove she went in the hospital, so please take this with a grain of salt.

The constant state of waiting is old for us, can you imagine what she feels like?

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In addition, women who give birth in public hospitals are also more than twice as likely to suffer tearing, or that their babies will need resuscitation.

Researchers looked at data on 790,000 births which took place over four years, and about a third were in the nation’s private hospitals.

Associate Professor Steve Robson, one of the authors of the study, said “There is often a lot of criticism in the medical press of rates of caesarean birth and rates of the induction of labour – everybody says ‘Wow they’re so much higher in private hospitals.’”

“And if you take the literature at face value … all of those things ought to up the complication rate, (but) it was lower.”

He added that says the study raises questions about the view that some in the medical fraternity hold that “increased rates of obstetric intervention are bad for women and their babies”.

The study, is to be published in the Medical Journal of Australia, and I hope it answers a few questions of mine. Such as,

1. Did the study take in to account the higher risk pregnancies and births the public system copes with? Most private hospitals will either not book in a high-risk pregnant woman or will transfer a sick or premature baby as soon as possible after birth.

2. What is the episiotomy rate as compared to the tear rate in the different hospital systems? Current wisdom seems to say that tears heal better than episiotomies, and thus epis are rarely given in public hospitals.

3. Was there any screening for socio-economic background and general health status of the participants?

I can’t wait to get my hands on it.

Launched last year by a mother of three and former TV producer, Go Home Gorgeous is an attempt to give new mothers a jump on recovery from delivery. And did me mention they do massages?

Business owner Rachel Swardson Wenham says after her giving birth to her third child, she was exhausted (sound familiar) and couldn’t summon the energy to look forward to going home with a newborn to two toddlers.

“I looked at my swollen legs, my dry skin and was startled by how old my bulbous veins made my hands look. I looked terrible and felt awful. Additionally, nothing about my environment was very healing in a comforting sense. I craved hydration, soothing music, aroma, and someone to tell me it would be okay. I didn’t want to just leave the hospital, I wanted to go home gorgeous.”

They probably can’t do much for the swollen legs. And the stretchmarks are here to stay. But who wouldn’t want a little pampering after thirteen hours of contracting followed by forty-five solid minutes of pushing? The pain of childbirth isn’t equal for everyone, but it leaves no one looking or feeling their best. We all share that same wan look in the first picture of mum and baby. And with an increased push to keep babies in the mother’s room at all times to promote better breastfeeding, it’s all exhaustion from there on out.

The way Wenham sees it, it doesn’t have to be that way. Let Dad take care of the baby for a forty-five minute message. Get a facial while the paediatrician is taking a look-see at the newborn. And you never have to leave the hospital.

Services run from $US45 to $US139 (pretty standard spa prices – and that’s when you’re going to them rather than them coming to you). So would you take them up on it?

Image/Source: MSNBC

New mothers will continue to receive free meals, but will have to buy £5 tokens from maternity ward machines to exchange for a pack of 10 bottles and teats (sounds cheap to me!)

The Rochdale Infirmary, run by the Pennine Acute Trust, stands to save $AU120,000 a year, though it claims it will sell the milk at cost. Mothers will not even be able to make their own formula or use milk prepared at home as there are no facilities to mix or store it.

So, seeing as mothers are free to breastfeed, is this discrimination?

A senior consultant at the hospital added: ‘While we encourage breastfeeding, many women are simply unable to do so. To charge them is absolutely preposterous. The ability to pay could affect how much nourishment a baby receives in its crucial first days.

The hospital argues it is unfair to ’subsidise women who choose not to breastfeed’ and stress that babies with medical requirements will have feeds given free.

I remember when I was in hospital breastfeeding was strongly encouraged, and if you wished to use formula you had to fetch your own bottles etc from the supply room. But conversely, when I had problems feeding, a dose of formula was strongly encouraged.

We hear more and more about the benefits of breastfeeding every day. If women truly can’t feed (and the hospital has lactation consultants on hand to assist), I have no problem with charging patients for their choice.

Does that make me a lactavist?

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