Chair of the ACT branch of the Australian College of Midwives Kai Hodgkin says a standalone birth centre will help reduce inappropriate intervention. Photo: UC.
The woman who launched the petition calling for the ACT Government to deliver a freestanding birth centre on the northside says the decision to go with a standalone facility on the planned new Northside Hospital campus is the next best thing.
Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith said the government had accepted in principle the recommendation of a feasibility study to establish a co-designed, standalone birth centre with a home-like environment for low-risk pregnancies on campus, where safe access to hospital facilities when required could be ensured.
ACT Health commissioned the study in response to the 3000-signature petition and a Greens motion from Ginninderra MLA Jo Clay in the Legislative Assembly in 2023.
The HealthConsult study looked at these two options, as well as the standalone birth centre model used at the Centenary Hospital for Women and Children in Phillip.
Petitioner Abbie McMillan said that although the outcome was not exactly what the community wanted, it was a good compromise.
Ms McMillan said it would still mean that well women in labour would not have to enter a hospital setting.
“You don’t want to have to walk into a hospital setting where you walk in and you’re hit with the bright lights, the smell of all the cleaning products,” she said.
“So it’s just removing that clinical sense of birth. It would be really beneficial to make sure that it had its own separate entrance.”
Ms McMillan said the community had called for a freestanding centre off campus because the further away from a hospital setting, the less chance of intervention.
“Once you start the intervention, you can’t stop it. It’s not like you can just do a little bit of an induction or a little bit of syntocinon.
“We also saw during COVID, the birth centre at the Canberra Hospital was turned into a COVID ward, so women weren’t even able to birth in the birth centre, and that’s because it was a part of the hospital.”
Ms McMillan said so many women wanted continuity of care from midwives, but Canberra did not have the physical resources to meet the demand.
Chair of the ACT branch of the Australian College of Midwives, Kai Hodgkin, said the decision was a massive win that left the door open to a freestanding centre in the future, subject to demand, more evidence and staffing certainty.
“Does it go as far as we wanted? No, but it’s still an amazing outcome for women and for the community, for midwives, for the whole maternity system,” she said.
Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith has asked Infrastructure Canberra to develop a co-design process for the new birth centre. Photo: Ian Bushnell.
Ms Hodgkin said she believed the new northside centre would reduce the amount of birth interventions in the ACT, which has the highest Caesarean section rate in the country at 42 per cent.
“The evidence from the UK, but also from Australia, clearly tells us that if we compare similar low-risk women who give birth in a hospital versus out of a hospital, the further away from the hospital you are, the less likely you are to have intervention, with the same safety,” she said.
“It tells us that being in the hospital increases the likelihood of having a Caesarian.”
Ms Hodgkin said eligibility for the centre and defining what constituted low risk would be key issues, so it was open to as many women as possible.
“We’re going to have to be really mindful of our eligibility criteria,” she said.
“For example, in our publicly funded home birth program, the eligibility criteria are very narrow, and so a lot of people get what we call ‘risked out’, so we need to make sure we maintain a reasonable screening program.”
Support from doctors was mixed, but like the home-birth program, the birth centre would find acceptance when it was up and running and could be shown to operate safely.
Both women stressed the importance of women having access to safe and appropriate intervention when needed.
The study found that the home-like, standalone option would offer a more natural birthing experience while still maintaining the safety net of proximity to hospital services, as well as the potential to attract and retain more midwives.
It also recommended the new birth centre be designed and constructed with a strong emphasis on cultural safety, trauma-informed care, and person-centred principles, particularly supporting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women in the ACT.
Ms Stephen-Smith said a standalone birth centre would be a valuable addition to public maternity care in the ACT, offering a low-intervention, midwife-led environment.
“The recommended model would provide the home-like setting that many expectant parents and midwives have advocated for, while also enabling quick, safe and dignified access to the new hospital if required,” she said.
Ms Stephen-Smith has asked Infrastructure Canberra to develop a co-design process to ensure the next steps are taken in consultation with stakeholders, including midwives, consumers and birth centre advocates.
Planning for the new northside hospital is continuing, with construction to commence in this term of government.
Original Article published by Ian Bushnell on Region Canberra.
