Running head: HISTORY OF MIDWIFERY 1

History of Midwifery
Stephanie Preston
HIST 1010
Instructor: Erin Kaspar-Frett
April 20, 2018
HISOTRY OF MIDWIFERY 2

In the documentary All My Babies: A midwife’s own story, Miss Mary seems to be a

competent midwife at the time of this filming in 1952 she had attended approximately 1400

births, but she still had to take women to a clinic to see a white nurse and then she was double

checked by a white male doctor. To me this just highlighted so well the cultural norms of the

1950’s with the heavy racial bias and the perceived hierarchy of not only race but gender as well.

Even though this racial bias has improved there are still improvements to be made. Black

mothers are 2-6 times more likely to die from complications of pregnancy than white women

(Flanders, 2000) and as of 2003 only 4% of CNM’s that identify as African American (Brown,

2008). There is still a great amount of space for improvement in care and diversity.

One of the things I found fascinating while watching All My Babies was the fact that

during the first birth scene when the woman is pushing and delivering her baby they muted the

sound until the baby cried. Even still today often times women are told to be quiet in labor that

their noises are bothering others. In my own personal experience one of my first doula births the

mother was laboring and in transition. She was very vocal, and her perineum was tearing, and

she was stuck in a laid-back position on the hospital bed. The OBGYN that was in attendance

during pushing told her that she needed to quiet down and settle down “or else”. He threatened

with a C-section all the way through till the baby was out if she didn’t stop moving and stop

yelling. Hospital staff ridiculing women for the noises they make is common (Williams, 2016).

Midwifery has drastically changed in the last century. In 1914 twilight sleep was

introduced, in 1938 it was used in almost every single delivery (Feldhusen, 2000). Today

twilight sleep is mostly viewed as inhumane. In 1894 the first C-section was preformed in

Boston (Feldhusen, 2000) and by 2013 32.7% of births were C-sections (Almendrala, 2015). By

1939 only 50% of women were delivering out of hospital now as of 2014 only 1.47% of births
HISOTRY OF MIDWIFERY 3

were out of hospital (Grunebaum, A, 2016). Some aspects of midwifery care have maintained the

same from the 1900’s to current. For example, Miss Mary weighed the baby almost the exact

same way that many midwives still weigh babies at home births today, in a sling scale very

similar to what my preceptor uses. Also she so gently encouraged the mother with side lying

nursing. By doing so she was able to keep the mother comfortable and resting but still

encouraged nursing.

There is much we can learn from how midwifery has evolved over the past century.

Following the example of granny midwives like Miss Mary and utilizing new technologies we

can provide quality care with better outcomes.

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Resources

Almendrala, A. (April 14, 2015). U.S. c-section rate is double what WHO recommends.
Retrieved from https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/14/c-section-rate-
recommendation_n_7058954.html

Ellerby-Brown, A., Sims, T. & Schorn, M. (2008). African American nurse-midwives:

continuing the legacy. Retrieved from
https://nursing.vanderbilt.edu/msn/pdf/nmw_midwiferyforAA.pdf
Feldhusen, A. (2000). The history of midwifery and childbirth in america: a time line. Retreived
from https://midwiferytoday.com/web-article/history-midwifery-childbirth-america-time-
line/
Flanders-Stepans, M. (2000). Alarming racial differences in maternal mortality. The Journal of
Perinatal Education, 9(2), 50-51. Doi: 10.1624/105812400X87653
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1595019/
Grunebaum, A. & Chervenak, FA. (October 1, 2016). Out-of-hospital births in the united states
2009—2014. Journal of Perinatal Medicine. (44(7) 845-849. Doi: 10.1515/jpm-2015-
0396 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26812856
Stoney, G. (1953). All my babies: A midwifes own story. Retrieved from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28kp021OuiY
Williams, C. (April 13, 2016). Are women’s birth sounds silenced in the hospital?. Retrieved
from https://www.huffingtonpost.com/camille-williams/are-womens-birth-sounds-
s_b_9678662.html