Healthy Birth Your Way

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Whole-Food Supplements: The Prenatal Vitamin Optionby Gerri L. Ryan, CPM, LMMuch has been written concerning the nutritional needs of pregnant women and whether the average diet supplies the necessary vitamins, minerals and nutrients to grow a healthy baby. This subject is quite polarized—some studies stating that adequate nutritional intake does not require supplementation and some indicating that specific supplementation may be needed for various risk factors. While this article does not attempt to resolve this question, it does propose an alternative to traditional prenatal vitamins—whole-food supplementation.

Next Meeting

San Diego Birth Network March Meeting

The SDBN March In-Service is a "Sharing Circle."

We all take OurSelves into our work caring for pregnant, post-partum, birthing, and new families. This is our time, as Providers, to "vent" a little, to ask for a listening ear, or to share our experiences of love, hope, frustration, anger, or whatever it is you want to share with the group. All providers are welcome. Please come with your stories, AND a listening ear.

OB Docs: What have we become?

Dr. Chukwuma Onyeije, who bills himself on Twitter as an information-age Maternal-Fetal Medicine Specialist, wrote a blog post about avoiding an unnecessary cesarean following a Twitter discussion that began with this commentary of CNN’s coverage of Joy Szabo’s recent birth:

In his post, 10 Ways to Avoid an Unnecessary Cesarean, Dr. Onyeije coins the term Physician VBAC Hysteria:

Patient’s trust physicians to make tough calls by virtue of our expertise, training and because they believe that we want what is best for them. My fear is that physicians risk losing the trust and goodwill we have with patients if we steer them away from safe vaginal deliveries toward unnecessary cesarean deliveries for questionable reasons. The current trend towards not offering VBAC may have begun due to concerns regarding safety or even medico-legal exposure; however at present, it has metastasized to inordinate levels that I have referred to as PVH (physician-VBAC-hysteria).

Baby's Bedding: Is It Creating Toxic Nerve Gases?

by Joanne B. Quinn, RMA, PhD

[Editor's note: This article first appeared in Midwifery Today, Issue 61, Spring 2002.]

Research done over the past 13 years in Great Britain and New Zealand indicates that Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) is an environmental poisoning in the crib. In 1988, Barry Richardson, a British chemist specializing in deterioration and preservation of materials, and Peter Mitchell, a marquee specialist, were working on Mitchell's deteriorating marquee, awnings and party tents. Mitchell's marquee supplier told him that the chemicals in awnings and tents were the same chemicals that had been approved for use in baby mattresses. Mitchell also learned from Richardson that these same chemicals could be converted into nerve gas. Mitchell and Richardson decided maybe there was a connection here to SIDS. The research by Richardson began immediately.

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