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The Forum > General Discussion > Elective C-sections - when it is not an elective

Elective C-sections - when it is not an elective

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I take great issue with the term elective caesarean, and the implications that the new policy on public patients has on some of those "electing" to deliver their baby surgically. This policy removes the right of a public patient to have an elective caesarean.

The term elective caesarean is applied to any pre-labour birth. The alternative is emergency caesarean, which is when something goes wrong in the birth, or the labour is abnormally long.

My first child was born by "elective" caesarean - not by my choice, but because my body wouldnt go into labour, even after repeated attempts at induction. I have since been informed by my doctor that all of my children will need to be born by caesarean, as there is something not right with my cervix - wont dilate properly.

Does the new policy mean that I cant have any more kids (seeing as I cant go into labour so could never have an "emergency" caesarean)? Does anyone have more information on this, as I have searched the Web and cant find anything conclusive -eg whether there are exceptions to the rule.

I wouldnt wish a caesarean on anyone, not when there is epidural/spinal blocks available to cut the actual pain of childbirth. The pain of a caesarean can be excrutiating for several days after the surgery, and full recovery is not made for around 6 weeks - its MAJOR abdominal surgery. Ok if you have a good support network around you with people willing to help vaccuum and do the washing, but pretty hard if you dont. I couldnt even lift the baby out of her bassinet for 3 days after I got home from hospital (a week after the birth). And then you cant drive anywhere for 6 weeks.... great if there is no public transport and you need to take the baby to the hospital for checkups.
Posted by Country Gal, Monday, 21 May 2007 3:13:01 PM
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Country Gal,

I would hope "elective" surgery encompasses births where natural birth is thought to be risky for either the mother or child, often established well before labour.

After an unpleasant first natural birth my wife and I discussed C-section for our second, but decided it wasn't our best option. We chose to go to a private hospital with a well regarded obstetritian and had a much better experience. Mainly due to the epidural.

The only reason I bring up the private hospital is our baby arrived naturally 3 days before the baby bonus kicked in. The maternity ward was practically empty as the truly elective C-sections were postponed. Apparently there were none scheduled that week(usually 20) and 10 were planned on the 1st of july.

While we missed out on $3000 the care and attention were outstanding.
Posted by rojo, Monday, 21 May 2007 10:00:39 PM
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I have had two natural births and two elective c-sections. I agree that C-sections are not the easy way out, they are excrutiating and you cannot care for your baby.

My first boy was born in a public hospital naturally he was over 4 kg and impacted and had shoulder dystocia and as a result suffers from Erbs Palsy. I am only small and it was obvious that the baby was going to be huge, not that the hospital took any notice.

The public hosptial decided that the second baby was also going to be huge after doing an ultrasound so they did a c-section, my little girl was not even 3 kgs.

I decided to find out the sex of my third and if it was a girl and not large I would try again for a natural birth. It was a girl and she was 3.5 kg so I tried a natural birth with a private doctor in a public hospital. She came out fine but apparently broke her collar bone.

My 4th was again a boy and weighed in at about 3.7 kg so I couldn't risk it and had an elective c-section with a private doctor in a public hospital.

I wonder whether if this was to happen now whether I would have a problem having the c-sections in a public hospital.
Posted by Jolanda, Tuesday, 22 May 2007 9:19:55 AM
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Rojo, certainly you are correct. There are circumstances where a health professional judges a natural delivery too risky for various reasons, and a c-section is decided on. From my understanding this is still considered elective (basically anything not emergency is elective). I would hope that the new rules do not include these cases!

Yes the way around is using a private hospital. However, I am afraid that before the birth of my next child, my private hospital waiting period (12 months) will not yet be up. Whilst this might be an option for future births (although I have to travel to the next town 70kms away - which I guess is not that bad in the scheme of things in this country), its not going to help with this one thats coming up!

Frankly I got quite cross with the surgeon last time when I had to fill in the forms and tick elective, given that nothing else was going to work (and I was pre-toxemic, so that kid HAD to cme out). Dont get me wrong, the hospital for the most part was great, particularly the doctors. Its a smallish town, so even as I public patient I got my own doctor. I had been sent over to the larger base hospital in the next town to see if there was anything they could do to induce labour, and it was a frightful place! They wanted to do the c-section there to start with - I couldnt get out of the place fast enough!!
Posted by Country Gal, Tuesday, 22 May 2007 10:38:41 AM
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Posted by johndd, Thursday, 24 May 2007 6:51:40 PM
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For anyone still checking this post, an update. Have discussed with a GP and they have pointed out that the media has had trouble differentiating between an elective caesarean and a request caesarean. Its the requests that now wont be done in the public system. As usual, the media is slightly off target....
Posted by Country Gal, Tuesday, 29 May 2007 8:53:34 PM
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