Breech References

Scroll down (Read More) to see the list of articles and books contributing to the Spinning Babies view on breech position and breech birth. Click on these underlined words to begin downloading the Bibliography for Breech pdf. [Adobe Acrobat PDF - 99.22 KB] You will download the Breech Bibliography pdf. that is at the bottom of this page. Use Acrobat Reader to view this pdf. file once it is on your desktop. You can download the Adobe Acrobat Reader for free onto your computer to see this and other pdf. files.

 

 

Books on Breech. 

 

Breech Birth, Woman Wise. Maggie Banks, 1998 Birth Spirit Books, 15 Te Awa Rd., RD 3, Hamilton, New Zealand.   Order the book at BirthInternational.com

Commentary on The Hannah Breech Trial by Maggie Banks on  Radical Midwives.

Active Breech Birth: the point of least resistance by Maggie Banks. In March 2006, [Maggie Banks] attended the 1st International Breech Birth Conference in Vancouver, Canada with midwives, medical practitioners and researchers discussing research, safety and techniques used during vaginal breech birth ... (full article in PDF format) fromBirthSpirit.

  

 

Breech Birth: What are my options by Jane Evans
Evans J., 2005 Breech Birth - What are my options? Association for Improvements in the Maternity Services, Manor Barn, Thurloxton, Taunton, Somerset, TA2 8RH

Buy at CAPERS bookstore.

From the Independent Midwives Association in the United Kingdom:

"Jane qualified as a midwife in 1976 and worked in the NHS for 20 years. She was instrumental in raising homebirth rates, introducing waterbirth and in developing a domino scheme in her local area of Hertfordshire. Jane has become renowned for her experience in breech birth, twin birth and VBAC. She has been a member of IMA since 1991."

 

 

Breech Birth.  Benna Waites, 2003  Free Association Books, 57 Warren Street, London. W1T 5NR

Buy at Amazon

 

 

 

 

 Anne Frye's Holistic Midwifery, Volume 2 has reliable information on breech birth. Watch for Jane Evans  for whatever you can find on the cardinal movements of the birthing breech baby and compare. Use Anne Frye as the foundation for your birth studies, overall. 

 

Medical Research

Many of the academic articles published on breech birth in the last decade have centered around the controversary following the Term Breech Trial, also known as the Hannah Trial.

 

Planned caesarean section versus planned vaginal birth for breech presentation at term: a randomised multicentre trial. Term Breech Trial Collaborative Group.Hannah ME, Hannah WJ, Hewson SA, Hodnett ED, Saigal S, Willan AR. Lancet. 2000 Oct 21;356(9239):1375-83.

 

Then two years later, the Hannah group came out with a reassuring finding:

 

Outcomes of children at 2 years after planned cesarean birth versus planned vaginal birth for breech presentation at term: the International Randomized Term Breech Trial. Whyte H, Hannah ME, Saigal S, Hannah WJ, Hewson S, Amankwah K, Cheng M, Gafni A, Guselle P, Helewa M, Hodnett ED, Hutton E, Kung R, McKay D, Ross S, Willan A; Term Breech Trial Collaborative Group. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2004 Sep;191(3):864-71. Department of Pediatrics, Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.  Comment in:

• Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2004 Sep;191(3):872-3.

 

An excellent explanation of the weakness of the Term Breech Trial came in 2004 from physician Andrew Kotaska:

 

Inappropriate use of randomised trials to evaluate complex phenomena: case study of vaginal breech delivery.  Andrew Kotaska, senior registrar1 BMJ  2004;329:1039-1042 (30 October), doi:10.1136/bmj.329.7473.1039   Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, University of British Columbia, BC Women's Hospital, Vancouver, BC, V6H 3V5 Canada

 

Another rebuttal came from Dr. Marek Glezerman calling to withdraw the Hannah recommendations for universal cesarean for breech position:

Five years to the term breech trial: the rise and fall of a randomized controlled trial. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2006 Jan;194(1):20-5. Glezerman M. Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Wolfson Medical Center, The Helen Schneider Hospital for Women, Holon, Israel.

Comment in:

• Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2006 Dec;195(6):e22; author reply e23.
• Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2006 Dec;195(6):1873; author reply 1873-4.

 

 

There are more great research articles, be sure to note if the articles and information you find on the web are research-based. Then read the research. Some research doesn't support the conclusions that the researchers make at the end of their published articles. Politics are in the birthing room. I'm not exempt, either. I have my opinion, too. Then, we have to separate the outcomes claimed for breech births where mother's are on their backs, and the midwife or physician extracts the baby compared to women on hands and knees  with a "hands-off-the-breech" approach. I was up putting this list on Spinning Babies as I waited for a midwife to call after her first breech catch. She and I had recently spent a day going over the Breech Update information I brought back to Minnesota after attending the Ottawa Breech conference last year. She had wanted to help the baby bend his knees, release his feet, etc. and every time she remembered me telling her, "hands off the breech, hands off the breech."   Mom and baby were tucked in, nursing, while she told me the story on her drive home. Now, I've got to go to bed, too.

 

  Breech Guidelines  

Vaginal or caesarean delivery? How research has turned breech birth around  Royal College of Midwives-Evidence-Based Midwifery, Sept, 2008 by Mary Steen,Carol Kingdon

I like this article because it sites Mary Cronk's breech protocols at the end. Very nice. Please take Mary Cronk's life-saving instruction to heart and hand:

"Independent midwife Mary Cronk has suggested that if the labour progresses spontaneously, (that is, the contractions come often, last longer, get stronger, the cervix effaces and dilates, and the breech descends through the pelvis), the baby will be born. If this does not happen there is no place for augmentation, that is, trying to push the baby through the pelvis with contractions driven by oxytocic drugs. Nor is there any place for trying to pull breeches through the pelvis with managed breech extractions. Labours that do not progress are telling us that the baby should be born by CS (Cronk, 1998). The RCOG has recommended that a CS should be considered if there is a delay in the descent of the breech at any stage in the second stage of labour (RCOG, 2006)."

Here are the Canadian Guidelines for Breech Birth. These are from the SOGC, and may differ from the guidelines of an experienced homebirth midwife who has done many breeches. See the quote above.

Vaginal Breech Delivery Guideline; The time has come. By Andre' B. Lalonde, Executive Vice-President of the Society of Obstetrics and Gynaecololgists of Canada.

 

 

Breech Birth stories on the web (please submit your own!)

While these are lovely stories, Spinning Babies does not link to them as examples of how to catch a breech. I'm hoping for photos of a mother in a knee-elbow (hands and knees) position with no one touching the baby. If you have the right to share such photos, I'd love to link to your site/blog. If you'd give me permission to use them in a Breech Update class for midwives, I'd love that, too, but I won't expect that from you, I'll just let it be an extra blessing if it comes my way. 

Later: Well, well, a little breechling blessed me. Her Mama, too! Here is the footage of a hands-off breech birth on the Spinning Babies blogspot.

Another hands-off footling breech birth this time with Lisa Barrett Australian Midwife. Give it time to load and suddenly you will see the little video screen on Lisa's blog.

Stories at the Coalition for Breech Birth website.

BirthingWay.com Footling Breech story with photos.

Sebastian's Breech Birth. His mother said no to a version and no to a cesarean and went home to have her baby. Her skilled midwife did a hands-on breech delivery reflecting the influence of medical practice on home birth midwifery rather than the hands-and-knees, hands-off approach promoted here at Spinning Babies. Still, this a sweet birth story.

More breech births on Birth Love

A footling breech before the midwives could arrive, the lovely story of Bruno's birth.

A happy hospital birth story of a frank breech baby in the UK. James' Breech birth.

A happy hospital birth story of a frank breech baby in the US (Denver) with mom in the OR and forceps used (perhaps as a routine gesture?). Natalie's breech birthAm J Obstet Gynecol. 2004 Sep;191(3):864-71.

 

 

Review article

with pictures of Vaginal Assisted Breech Delivery. Extraction

Breech Presentation

Author: Richard Fischer, MD, Division Head, Maternal-Fetal Medicine, Professor, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Section of Maternal-Fetal Medicine, Cooper University Hospital, updated on their website on Jul 7, 2009.

Remember, an assisted breech delivery is a breech extraction. Compare these photos to the spontaneous movements of a breech birth in which the baby does her own cardinal movements - without "assistance."

See the preferred technique of a physician or midwife in this photo. See how he sits patiently, and not even in the same room as the laboring woman. Later, he will calmly hold his hands together while the baby emerges on her own.

 

http://www.BreechBirth.ca

http://www.UnderstandingBirthBetter.com    Betty-Anne Daviss and Ken Johnson

http://www.Homebirth.net.au/search/label/breech  Lisa Barrett’s blog  http://www.homebirth.net.au/2008/04/breech-birth.html

http://www.SpinningBabies.com and blog http://spinningbabies.blogspot.com/2010/06/baby-june-home-breech-birth-june-2010.html

http://www.StandandDeliver    Rixa Freeze’s blog

http://www.aims.org.uk/Journal/Vol10No3/handOffbreech.htm Mary Cronk’s “Hands Off” article at AIMS.org.uk