Birth centres first appeared in Australia during the early 1980's. This was primarily in response to providing a 'half way' point between having your baby in a hospital delivery suite and a home birth. They became more popular in the 1990's and are now an integral part of the maternity health care system both here and in other parts of the world. Birth centres can be attached to major public maternity hospitals or be 'free standing'. They are usually run by midwives but have medical help on call if it becomes necessary.
The main philosophy of a birth centre is based around the belief that having a baby is a normal physical process (not an illness) and in most cases, if nature is left to its own devices, pregnancy and birth will happen normally without medical interventions. Therefore, birth centres try and create a place for women and their families to have their babies with minimal interference unless complications arise and they become necessary.
The criteria to use a birth centre generally relies on a woman's pregnancy, labour and birth to be progressing relatively normally, anticipating that your baby will be healthy and born at
term. This will usually be the case for up to 80 to 85% of women. If complications do arise during the pregnancy or labour, your care would be transferred to the doctors in the delivery suite. The policies and guidelines for what is acceptable to be cared for in a birth centre will vary from centre to centre. However, in recent years the policies have become more flexible. For example, many birth centres now accept women for induction if they go overdue, women with Diabetes not on insulin injections and women having a vaginal birth after Caesarean (VBAC), discussed in
class 9.
In 1999 in Australia, about 2.1% of all births happened in a birth centre.