Well after Dr. Amy's sad attempt at turning the rising cesarean section, and labor induction rates into a debate about home birth in Colorado..... (Kinda like the price of tea in China) I figured I would further aid to my debate with some simple numbers.
This is exactly what tells us that there is a problem in the United States Maternity Care...
2008 Cesarean Birth Rate = 31.8%
1970 Cesarean Birth Rate = 5.5%
Maternal Mortality Rate per 100,000 live births in the United States
1970 - 21.5 (5.5% Cesarean Section Rate) *2.2% VBAC Rate
1975 - 12.8 (10.4% Cesarean Section Rate) *2% VBAC Rate
1980 - 9.2 (16.5% Cesarean Section Rate) *3.4% VBAC Rate
1985 - 7.8 (22.7% Cesarean Section Rate) *6.6% VBAC Rate
1989 - 7.9 (22.8% Cesarean Section Rate) *18.9% VBAC Rate
1990 - 8.2 (22.7% Cesarean Section Rate) *19.9% VBAC Rate
1991 - 7.9 (22.6% Cesarean Section Rate) *21.3% VBAC Rate
1992 - 7.8 (22.3% Cesarean Section Rate) *22.6% VBAC Rate
1993 - 7.5 (21.8% Cesarean Section Rate) *24.3% VBAC Rate
1994 - 8.3 (21.2% Cesarean Section Rate) *26.3% VBAC Rate
1995 - 7.1 (20.8% Cesarean Section Rate) *27.5% VBAC Rate
1996 - 7.6 (20.7% Cesarean Section Rate) *28.3% VBAC Rate
1997 - 8.4 (20.8% Cesarean Section Rate) *27.4% VBAC Rate
1998 - 7.1 (21.2% Cesarean Section Rate) *26.3% VBAC Rate
1999 - 9.9 (22.0% Cesarean Section Rate) *23.4% VBAC Rate
2000 - 9.8 (22.9% Cesarean Section Rate) *20.7% VBAC Rate
2001 - 9.9 (24.4% Cesarean Section Rate) *16.4% VBAC Rate
2002 - 8.9 (26.1% Cesarean Section Rate) *12.6% VBAC Rate
2003 - 12.1 (27.6% Cesarean Section Rate) *10.6% VBAC Rate
Now, I am no expert in analyzing statistics or numbers, but you can see a clear trend starting around 1980, though the cesarean section rate increases, so does the number of VBAC's. While VBAC's continue to increase the maternal death rate goes down.
Lets move to the year of the peak VBAC numbers which is 1996. We see a low maternal mortality rate, which starts to increase as the number of VBAC's and an increase in cesarean sections continues.
We get to 2003, which has a 27.6% cesarean section rate, a LOW 10.6% VBAC rate and a high maternal mortality rate.
It is not rocket science to know that the increase in cesarean sections and decrease in VBAC's are aiding this issue.
The risking cesarean section rates are killing mothers.
More so than Midwives in Colorado.
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5 comments:
I love statistics. It was the only math class I was ever good at.
These numbers are very frightening. I think as a whole the stats are more important than 8 (though still important) mothers in Colorado who may or may not have turned down medical assistance because of religious reasons.
It's called getting the WHOLE STORY. Not just taking the headline and the intro paragraph because that says what you want it to. :facepalm:
Thanks for posting this!
Really? A pattern after 1980? I've just graphed the data myself and cannot see what you're seeing. Any chance you could post an image of your graph? I'm seeing a huge rise and fall in VBAC rates while maternal death rates remain steady.
Also, if there's a correlation, then you should be able to plot the death rate and VBAC rates as coordinate pairs for each year and get get a fit for the data. I seem to get an R^2 of about 0.5 - I certainly wouldn't call that a good correlation.
There was not a VBAC decline that impacted Maternal Mortality until the 1990's.
You can choose to plot the numbers into a graph if you please, but I do not have the means to do it myself.
All statistics were obtained from the CDC website itself.
So looking at this and following your own observations it is clear that it is far safer to have a C-Section than a VBAC.
Amy K, how do you figure that? The maternal mortality rates in recent years were HIGHER with lower VBAC rates. Please explain?
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