How Far Away from Hospital for Homebirth

[dinahx]

I am posting here because I need a few opinions:

How far away from the hospital can you be and still safely have a homebirth, in your opinion?

The closest hospital that I would actually go to is 33 minutes away. There is one 39 minutes away, but the closest one at which I could reasonably have a transfer doctor is 54 minutes away. All of these times are driving normal speeds . . .

[Rowankc]

We have had a couple of transports in the past few months, that were about an hour from the hospital, one was a true CPD, and babe was doing fine, but mama was exhausted, the other was an acynclitic head, and she just could not get babe down, she had meconium, and we did not mess around... Both babes and mamas were fine, they both had sections, but they was appropriate, for both situations. I think that there are situations that are very emergent, such as a prolapsed cord, but most situations are just like ours, where you just know that things are not going to progress, and so you transport

[Kirsten]

I'm not a birth professional, but have had a homebirth. Nearest hospital was about 15 minutes I guess, but the one we'd have gone to was about 25/30. Nearest natural birth friendly was 45 minutes so we'd have gone there if it wasn't urgent. I didn't need to transfer though.

What helped me be ok with homebirthing half an hour from the hospital was that I'd already had two natural births (one with midwife in hospital, one with midwife at freestanding birth center), my midwives were incredible and I trusted them completely, and I was due the end of May so no bad roads to contend with. We do have a lot of traffic at certain times between here and the hospital, so times could be worse even if you were speeding. But in the end, I just felt ok with it.

I don't understand about the transfer doctor being 54 minutes away. Your midwife's backup doesn't have privledges at the nearer hospitals?

[dinahx]

Midwife's backup? Ha! I live in an midwife-oppressing state. There is a VERY natural birth friendly doctor who would accept me as a patient and not expect me to show up if you kwim, 54 minutes away. For the hospitals that are closer, I, of course, could visit a doctor/midwife and then only call them if I needed them, but I don't know how "cool" they would be with that plan.

I am perhaps overly concerned with the transfer possiblity (my BFF just pointed this out! ) But I did transfer for decels in my last birth so . . .

[tammyswanson]

Not a 'birth professional' either, but at my UC HB, if I had needed to transfer (thank GOD I didn't), it would have taken an hour to get to the hospital.