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Midwife back to the centre...
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Every child deserves to come into this world at a moment of his choosing. Every child deserves the warmth of mother's womb for as long as nature desires. Trying to say as much is Nutan Pandit, a self-styled modern-day midwife who believes that in most cases caesarean operations can be avoided.RANA A. SIDDIQUI reports... .
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INDIA HAS a high caesarean birth rate though natural childbirth can easily be adopted. Doctors have a tendency to induce labour when an expecting woman's estimated date of childbirth is taken as the estimated date of `appointment'. If she does not deliver at that date or a few days later, she is often "forced" to deliver by inducing labour, clinically. "This is unhealthy and wrong practice. It is like plucking a fruit before it is ripe. Instead, the mother should be given at least a few more days to deliver the child naturally."
So believes Nutan Lakhanpal Pandit, an associate of Natural Childbirth Trust of London and the Breastfeeding Promotion Network -- BPNI -- and Delhi's only one-woman organisation that provides courses on easy and natural childbirth. She drives away many misconceptions, myths and wrong practices that expecting couples adopt out of ignorance and that also remains the main cause of high rate of caesarean birth rate across the country.
"Letting the child happen in the natural rhythm than adjusting him to the hospitable time-table is what happens in most cases in India. If a woman isn't able to deliver within 38 weeks of pregnancy, she is immediately induced labour in the hospitals, while waiting for 40 weeks is just normal. It helps child arrive in conducive environs required at the time of birth," Nutan reveals. The general practice of wiping the newborn with a chemical to clean and slapping to make him cry is a wrong practice. "The child should only be washed with lukewarm water at body temperature because the temperature that he has inside the womb must be maintained soon after his birth. It is ridiculous to `make him cry', it is like hurrying his breathing process which should come natural," she adds. Nutan's words might make many doctors and nurses unhappy for it is the general practice in most hospitals, but she has learnt it easy way -- through her personal experience of giving birth to two children, a course in National Childbirth Trust in London -- their classes and workshops and also regular visits to Dr. Michel Odent's Unit at Pithivers, France, famed for various unconventional methods of conducting childbirth. But that does not make her a doctor. "Even midwives were not doctors, but they always helped baby happen in most easy ways," she argues. Because of midwife and natural childbirth practices in Europe, Netherlands and France, they have only five to six per cent caesarean birth rate while in India the legitimate right caesarean birth rate is 10 to 15 per cent though it rises up to 60 per cent -- all because of ignorance and doubts attached to the conventional method," she argues.
Does it mean one should go back to the conventional `dai' - midwife -- system of childbirth? "Yes, supported by additional medical facilities. Why make a child a high-technology product, why not let it occur as nature prescribes?" she queries. And in her twice a week, 21-day course for two-and-half-hour for Rs 3000 at her Defence Colony residence she provides all information pertaining to an easy, natural child birth, pre and post natal care, weight gain, proper diet, posture, exercises, breathing patterns and a lot more. She has also authored three books on the subject: Pregnancy -- Rupa and Company, Question and Answers on Pregnancy -- UBSPD and Garbhavastha -- Manjul Publishing House. A member of women's FICCI, Empress and Rotary Club, Nutan also conducts classes at Sir Gangaram Hospital.
She regrets that despite several attempts to encourage natural childbirth through workshops and classes, no nursing homes lent a receptive year. She suggests: "A cohesive effort from the Government to promote natural child birth through properly orchestrated institutions would curb high caesarean birth rate." Is the Department of Social Justice listening?
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