How many births has your homebirth MW attended?

[SaveTheWild]

Hi all,

So I am in the process of finding a midwife for my homebirth (I actually have one now that I love, but we are moving out of the state, so I need to find another one).

This is my first, so I am probably more of a worry wart about things than second and third timers...

anyway, I am struggling with how important having a lot of experience is in the decision. There are two midwives I am thinking about. one has been to literally hundreds of homebirths, but has a much busier practice, so doesn't spend as much time with each mom (e.g. the prenatals are at her office, not at the clients home, etc.). The other has only 66 births, some of which were when she was an apprentice. But because she has a smaller practice, she is more client focused, prenatals at home, etc.

I know that chances are that everythign will go really smoothly. but in case they don't I guess I assume that someone who has been present at more births will hav more tricks up her sleeve and will get less panicked than someone with fewer births.

So I guess my questions are:

how much experience does/did you midwife have?

Was is an important part of the reason you chose them?

thanks!

SaveTheWild

[Snowdrift]

I'm seeing a partnership of two midwives. The senior partner has around 300; the junior partner around 100. I'm comfortable with both of them, but I'm also having ym first and am glad to have the more experienced one available. Even if she isn't the one on call when I'm in labor/birthing, she'll be accessible if needed. If I wasn't a first timer I think I'd be happy with the less experienced one alone, but primips have such a high transfer rate overall that I'm glad of the access to a very experience midwife.

But then midwives spend so much time and compared to doctors or CNM's take on so few women that 66, or like mine around 100, is really quite a few and reflects a couple to several years of experience.

[Ooey]

My main mw has about 30 years of experience! And the 3 others that work with her all have diffrent levels of experience. It did impact our decision. The other mw's we interviewed each had less than 3 years experience, and between 60-150 births each. I felt less comfortable around them, and they seemed more ready to do a hospital transfer at the first little sign of a problem.

[girlsmamma2]

I think it's also important to know what a jr. mw was doing before she became a mw. Was she a doula? Was she an apprentice? Was she working at wal-mart? My jr. mw was actually in medical school and close to graduating, until she decided midwifery was where her heart was. So even though she hasn't attended as many births as the senior, I feel completely and equally trusting of her abilities. She was at my 2nd dd's birth and was absolutely great. I think wisdom from years of experience build confidence and ability. But also what path they were taking before and who they studied under makes a big difference. I trust both my mw's implicitly but both have totally different backgrounds. I feel i have the best of both worlds.

now an ob fresh out of medical school, that's scary to me. i guess an ob in general but the fresh ones really freak me out. oh....also i met a dr. last time when we were dr hopping that had a scary birth herself . So even if she had a patient that had low risk factors, she was a fanatic about monitoring etc just because of what happened to her. She was also very, very rough in a prenatal checking position of baby. So i think it's important to know the number of births, i totally hear you on that, but also what path they have taken to get there and what their past experience is. OB or mw.

[MamaTaraX]

how much experience does/did you midwife have?
13 or 14 yrs, 400+ births

Was is an important part of the reason you chose them?
It was only part of the reason. She was chosen because she has a great reputation around here, canme highly recommended, but mostly because when she walked in the door, I *knew*

Namaste, Tara

[mama_at_home]

If I remember correctly my midwife was nearing 1400 births. Those are babies she has personally delivered, not just was in attendance for. She had delivered at least 7 sets of twins, which was important to me. She was also experienced in breech births which was another important thing. I believe she has been practicing about 25 years. We were her 8th set of twins and first twin waterbirth. I LOVE my midwife. I had been strongly leaning toward another midwife because I knew her from church but she had only done about 200 births and had never done twins. My midwife and the one that came to help are by far the most experienced homebirth midwives in my area.

[violetbutterfly]

I only had two to choose from and both had equal experience. My MW ended up calling me back first and so I asked her my list of questions and then met with her in person and I liked everything I heard. What really sealed the deal for me was when our neighbor who is a NICU nurse at the local hospital said that she had never even HEARD of our midwife but knew the other one by name and saw her quite often. That really freaked me out and I knew we had made the right decision. I think sometimes experience matters but also where do they stand on medical intervention? Not all midwives are created equal and I would be using more than just experience to go on if I had to find a MW again.

[txgal]

My midwife has attended @ 1500 homebirths. It is definetly comforting to know that she has pretty much seen it all as far as complications/emergencies. I don't think I would feel as comfortable with someone who had only attended a couple hundred births.

[*guest]

I nixed one who had 80 births, but she did answer other questions in a way that I didn't like at all. She had sort of an overall nervous demeanor, and that didn't seem right to me either. In the practice that I'm using, one has something like 1200, and the other closer to 500. Of the two of them, I prefer the less experienced one. And their apprentice is also lovely and inspires confidence. But I went with them not for total # of births but because of how they answered my questions about specific preferences. It was a gut feeling too, and my husband felt the same thing. Can you talk to references from both of your choices? How are the statistics for transfer and interventions for both choices? Has the less experienced one handled any situations that she considers challenging? What's her backup like, as someone new to practicing?

[kerikadi]

Originally Posted by txgal

My midwife has attended @ 1500 homebirths. It is definetly comforting to know that she has pretty much seen it all as far as complications/emergencies. I don't think I would feel as comfortable with someone who had only attended a couple hundred births.

:
But then again we have the same MW

Keri

[KBinSATX]

Originally Posted by tie-dyed

I'm seeing a partnership of two midwives. The senior partner has around 300; the junior partner around 100. I'm comfortable with both of them, but I'm also having ym first and am glad to have the more experienced one available. Even if she isn't the one on call when I'm in labor/birthing, she'll be accessible if needed.

Same here. The partners have attended over 400 births total but I know one partner had a practice by herself for a few years so it's probably the same type of split.

[TurboClaudia]

how much experience does/did you midwife have?
not sure how many births/years.... let me check... (off to her website)
attending births for over 11 years (the past 6 as a midwife) and over 300+ families

Was is an important part of the reason you chose them?
a factor, yes, but not as important a factor as finding the "right fit" and the person my partner and i felt most comfortable with.

~claudia

[mamakima]

Well...for my first birst I choose a very expereinced midwife and in the end I think it was her "experience" that led me to nearly having the baby on the side of the road!!! I planned a free-standing birth center birth over an independent homebirth midwife for many reasons mostly because we live in a community setting and didn't think I could totally relax with many others around. But my labor was VERY quick and because she had checked my cervix earlier that day and I was not even a little bit effaced yet she said there was "no way I could be very far along in labor." 15 minutes later I started to push and I had to get in the car for the 45 min trip to the birth center. Her head was out when we arrived and the rest of her was deposited on the waiting room floor. I really think that because I didn't follow a "typical" pattern her experiece stopped her from listening to a woman who was clearly in transition. (Shaking, needing to pee/poop, loud, etc.) So I do not believe experience is the only thing to look for in a midwife....I think it's better to know whether she can really "hear" you.
By the way I am pregnant now and am having a homebirth and never even asked my midwife how many births she has attended. Sometimes the newer midwives are more attentive because they are slighty more nervous. That's my 2 cents!!

[maybebaby]

Well, apparently they've (this hb mw practice) been around almost 30 years and have nearly 2000 births under their belts ...laughing because I didn't even know that until I just went to their website!

They came recommended and I felt at ease with them last time, I knew they'd been around a while I just didn't know it was 30 yrs. They just had the right vibe and the right answers to my questions

This will be our second birth with them.

So I guess while it's nice to know they've got the experience, I didn't *need* to know that in order to choose them!!

[DreamsInDigital]

My midwife, who is the same one Claudia is seeing, doesn't just have experience as a midwife. She used to be a massage therapist, a doula, she used to run a well woman clinic and she is a trained herbalist.
But honestly, just the way we connected and how at ease I felt with her, not to mention her reputation around MDC were all the reasons I'd chosen her and would have done so even if she'd only been a practicing midwife for a year.

[Zyla]

Eh. My first midwife had lots of experience, and attended births both at home, and at the hospital -- but she ended up being awful. Mainly, I think, because she was over-extended: half a dozen births a week, and I was her third that day ...

My second birth I again hired a midwife with lots and lots of experience -- including breech births, which was important because my baby was breech, and even though I had him turned sucessfully, there was a chance he would turn again. Anyway -- again, as it turned out ... well, I'd never recommend her!

During both of these pregnancies I had exceptionally lovely prenatal experiences with these women.

Third time I went with a woman who was already a friend! She'd been a doula for many years and was an apprentice of senior standing with an experienced midwife whom several of my friends recommended. Anyway, my baby was her first official "catch" as a midwife (her training midwife was there as well, as the assistant). And it was wonderful. My best birth.

[BethSLP]

My MW is the same as Kerikadi and Txgal. 1,500 births. WOW!

We just had our birth class on the "dark side" where she went through all the negatives of what can happen, what she would do, etc. etc. and what she has personally experienced.

It left me more confident than before! Her success rate is phenomenal, and all the complications she has had sound just as possible with a hospital birth.

I was in awe of her as she talked about shoulder dystocia and showed no less than 5 different maneuvers she would try. It was so automatic for her it seemed to rattle off each thing she would do and demonstrate it with a fake pelvis and baby. She is truly a master.

I think its important to consider # of births, rather than years of experience. Also, who a MW has apprenticed with etc. My MW has an assistant and I know she has learned A LOT from being around this MW with so much experience.

XOXO
B

[sebarnes]

My midwife had over 10 years experience and 400 plus births. While that was important to us, the quantifiable thing we were more concerned with was her emergency transfer rate, which was below 1% and what complications she had experience with (just about everything!) I my midwife!