Have you experienced a third or forth degree tear?

If so, I would love to hear your story. Your experience following a third or fourth degree perineal tear following the birth of your baby or babies, will help with research so we can assess how the health care system can best care for all women who experience this complication following childbirth.

For further information please contact Holly Priddis (Midwife, PhD Candidate and Researcher) via email h.priddis@uws.edu.au or phone/text 0438 731 816.

Birth Stories Competition

We are excited to announce Pregnancy Birth and Beyond's 'Birth Stories Competition'. Everyone loves reading birth stories, stories about fast labours, slow labours, wonderful stories, sad stories, births at home, hospital or birth centre. We'd like you to send us your story. If you have photos of your labour, birth, baby or the new family that help illustrate your story we'd love to receive those as well. The best three birth stories will receive the prize. Selected birth stories will be published on this website.

We have three copies of this gorgeous keepsake for Australian children, the Limited Edition, Heritage Presentation of Animal Tales Series by Susan Hall and illustrations by Ben Guy to give away. The boxed set contains 4 individual hard cover books, 52 pages each. The National Library of Australia Publishing (NLA Publishing) is offering this highly successful Animal Tales series as a limited edition heritage presentation. A gorgeous keepsake for Australian babies and children!

To enter visit the "Birth Stories Competition" page of www.pregnancy.com.au 

Supporting women in Public Hospitals after a homebirth transfer

This last fortnight has been quite stressful. It started with a report that a midwife had been reported for supporting a women in hospital who she gave a hot pack. The charge was she'd been practising midwifery without insurance. Then came a communication from MIGA (the insurance company) essentially saying that if a midwife stayed with a women after she transferred to hospital they would be in breach of their registration. This was shortly followed by a communication from the Australian College of Midwives basically saying the same thing. Yesterday sanity prevailed - Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency released a document clarifying this issue. You can find the official documentation on this page of AHPRAs website. Yes we can stay with a women who is admitted as a public patient as a support person. However the question of what constitutes midwifery care remains.

First baby to be born at Orange Aboriginal Birth Centre

I had the pleasure of visiting Murundhu dharaa birthing centre at Orange last month. It is a wonderful facility. Here is a news report of their first birth at the centre.

International Midwives Day

Today is International Midwives Day and I had nothing special planned. The day has been punctuated with messages wishing me happy International Midwives Day. It has been wonderful and makes enjoy even more being a midwife. Our local homebirth group "Homebirth Access Sydney" has just sent me a bunch of flowers - I feel overwhelmed and very lucky to receive such support and well wishes from the homebirth community.

I'd like to wish all the midwives across the world a very big "Happy International Midwives Day".

Love Jane xxx

Free tickets to Babies: The Movie

Last chance to be in the draw to win double pass tickets to Babies: The Movie. Details below. Entries have to be in by 9am on tomorrow 2nd of May. Visit bit.ly/jMd94s for details.

Water Birth Photo Gallery

New to Pregnancy, Birth and Beyond's website is the Waterbirth Photo Gallery. Waterbirth facilitates gentle, safe and empowering birth. This waterbirth photo gallery celebrates the wonderful option of waterbirth. Photos can say far more than words. If you have any waterbirth photos you are willing to share please email me.

Water Birth Photo Gallery (Pregnancy, Birth and Beyond)

Midwifery in action.wmv

Midwifery in Action is a short video that provides a glimpse into what midwives do and the special relationship that can develop between midwives, women and their family. Anna, Marc and Baby Ben share their journey through pregnancy, birth and the postnatal period with midwifery care. You'll see the continuum of care through prenatal visits, a home waterbirth and postnatal care.

Australian Resuscitation Council Release Revised Guidelines

The Australian Resuscitation Council (ARC) has now published its revised resuscitation guidelines for Basic, Advanced, Paediatric and Neonatal Life Support. These changes reflect the most recent scientific evidence which was evaluated and recently published by the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR) and its member organisations, including the Australian Resuscitation Council.

The guidelines continue to emphasise the importance of commencing resuscitation and providing good quality CPR. Resuscitation should be commenced where the person is unresponsive and not breathing normally as feeling for a pulse is unreliable in determining if a person needs resuscitation. It is now recommended that at the commencement of resuscitation 30 chest compressions are provided before giving the initial rescue breaths. The compression / ventilation remains at 30 compressions to 2 ventilations. The ARC also recommends that if a person is unwilling or unable to provided full CPR (ie chest compressions plus rescue breathing) then they should provide continuous chest compressions at a rate of just over 1 compression per second.

The revised guidelines for Basic, Advanced, Paediatric and Neonatal Life Support are available at www.resus.org.au and for the first time have been jointly developed and published with the New Zealand Resuscitation Council (NZRC).

Belated Christmas Gift

I received this bottle of wine as a belated Christmas gift. No it isn't a hoax - it is a genuine bottle of wine. Someone told the wine maker about the effects of Oxytocin on the body and they thought what a perfect name for a wine. The label reads "You know that feeling when you're on top of the world, you've got a smile on your face and a warm inner glow? It's probably Oxytocin - a wonderful hormone our brain naturally releases putting us into a state of bliss.

Sometimes Oxytocin is called the 'love drug', because it's integral in the boding between mother and child, lovers and friends ..."