Experiences with birth in water

By midwife Jenny Jensen, Zealand (educated as a midwife in 2001. Has worked at Rigshospitalet, Gentofte hospital, and Holbaek hospital, private midwife in Home Birth arrangement of western Zealand, and as a midwife substitute in Greenland and as a substitute via KinnerupCare).

Benefits of water birth:

• Pain relief:
  Water seems to relax the body muscles and the relaxation reduces the pain.
  
  
• Birth positions:
  The water helps the woman to be in a pressing position for a longer time than she could normally endure
  
  
• A gentle start for the child:
  To be born in water is a gentle start for the child who is given a bit more time before it will start breathing. Waterbabies cry less after birth.
  
  
• Stay and birth in water:
  First of all many pregnant women choose to stay in water during birth because it feels good. The warm water seems relaxing and pain relieving and it also provides more freedom of movement. Often labours tend to be shorter and the contractions become more efficient. Also it can influence whether the woman has less tearings.
  Some women give birth in the water, others step out of the pool to give birth. It is up to the woman to feel what is best for her. Some get too hot others may perhaps have the need of a more solid support for the body or wish to get to their feet. During the entire course the woman can change according to her needs.
  
  
• The water helps to a better birthing position:
  Physiologically the woman is originally created to give birth to her child in an upright/squatting position, however most women have serious problems when standing or squatting for a long time. Therefore a birth pool is often ideal. The water in the pools helps the woman to find a more ergonomically correct birthing position, and at the same time the warm water is powerfully relaxing the muscles and thus pain relieving. This relaxation and pain relief often result in a shorter and easier labour.

By the midwives at Aarhus University Hospital, Skejby:

”Warm water is often relaxing and many women benefit from that during labour. The birth pool can be used during the dilation period, during the second-stage labour pains, and when the child is being born.

Women who have used birth pools for child birth emphasise the freedom of movement in water as well as the greater feeling of privacy during their labour."

Aarhus University Hospital, Skejby has been practising water births since 1996 and approx. 4 % women give birth in water. 3 of 4 delivery rooms have birth pools.

The latest theories within water births point to the fact that immersion in body warm water enhances the secretion of hormones which stimulate contractions. This means that the uterine muscle will often open faster. It is assumed that the need of pain relieving medicine is less and that there are fewer and smaller tearings when staying in warm water during the course of birth.

Immediately after delivery the midwife will help the child’s head above water and it will start breathing within the first minute. From birth newborns have a ”diving reflex” which causes that they do not breathe below water. Once the child has come out of the water its head must not get under water again.

The placenta is normally born within 10 - 20 minutes after the child. It can be born in the birth pool or in the delivery chair