Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Incontinence versus DEATH?

I love Meredith who writes the Baby Bump Project blog. In her post 'Caesareans: preventing the 'trauma' of natural birth' she talks about a surgeon in Sydney who presents cesarean section as a completely 'risk free' option to the 'terrible' outcomes of vaginal birth which includes incontinence. Meredith says in a nutshell:

Right. And what were the risks of caesarean again? Oh that's right. I think DEATH is on the top of the list. I think I'll take a little incontinence (which can be remedied with exercise!) over a casket.

Postscript: The reality is that cesarean section is unlikely to make much difference to incontinence later in life - it is not so much the birth process that causes incontinence, but pregnancy.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes one of the things about this kind of communication is that people can literally publish whatever nonsense they like - without necessarily being credible and once it's out there the damage is done. Thanks to both sarah and meredith for pulling this surgeon up (did he even provide a name?).
And what about some balance - I could talk forever about the wonderful benefits to my life of naturally birthing vaginally.

Sarah Stewart said...

Same here...and I had 2 episiotomies (vaginal cuts)!!!

k.thedoula said...

I love you... truely I do.
C/S for single footling breech... incontinent for months due to abdominal pain *who would have thought an easy simple oh so safe c/s would be painful? snort...
HBAC with 3rd degree tear and a broken tailbone
18 months later another hbac.
My pelvic floor has actually gotten better after each 'birth'.
Again.
I LOVE YOU!
smooches from Canada!

Sarah Stewart said...

Gosh, mm, you certainly haven't had life easy, have you!? Thank you for dropping by and leaving your comment.

I must say at this point that obviously some Cesarean sections are life saving, both for mum and baby - I have seen that many times in all my years as a midwife. But the growing trend to do them at a 'drop of the hat' is very worrying especially as we do not know what the long term outcomes will be.