Interesting Facts About Midwives and Childbirth
WORLDWIDE, 80 percent of babies are born into the hands of midwives. In the United States, midwives attend only 10 percent of deliveries, but that number is growing. Ten years ago, it was only 3 percent.
Since 2002, certified nurse-midwives have delivered more than three million mothers in the United States. More families are choosing to deliver at home. In 2011, there were more than 26,000 home births in the United States.
During the period between 1900 and 1930, in this country, maternal deaths during or soon after childbirth were 7 per 1,000 women. One out of ten infants did not survive the first year of life.
Currently in the United States, there are more than 13,000 certified nurse-midwives. CNMs are trained in universities as RNs and usually have master’s degrees. They can do gynecological care and some primary care and write prescriptions for medication as well as deliver babies in the home, a birthing center, or a hospital. There are also more than 400 certified professional midwives. A CPM is usually not an RN but a direct-entry midwife who specializes in natural deliveries in birthing centers and at home. The author has had two babies at home with midwives and believes it’s a safe alternative for low-risk women if the provider is experienced, well trained, and has a backup plan in case of problems.
For more information or to find a midwife in your community, go to:
American College of Nurse-Midwives: www.midwife.org
Midwives Alliance of North America: www.mana.org
Praise for Patricia Harman’s amazing new novel
the MIDWIFE
of HOPE RIVER
“The Midwife of Hope River, set in Depression-era West Virginia, is still on my mind days after finishing. From start to satisfying conclusion, it is a beautifully imagined novel, a marvel of a debut, rich with fully realized characters and events. This is one I’ll read again, more slowly next time.”
—Johanna Moran, author of The Wives of Henry Oades
“As always when writing of birth, the bleakest of times can be transformed by the power and beauty of birth. Despite the desperate times and the bleak setting of this novel, the moments of joy between new parents and their babies, between the mothers and the midwife, and between the midwife and her young assistant light up the pages. Amen, baby!”
—Penny Armstrong, CNM, author of
A Midwife’s Story and A Wise Birth
“The Midwife of Hope River is a rich and deeply moving book that will pleasantly linger in your thoughts long after you’ve finished reading it. Smart about the medical details of birth, the book is equally smart about the sustaining power of community, human connectedness, and love. Patricia Harman has created such a striking and original heroine that pregnant women everywhere will be wanting Patience Murphy to deliver their babies, while the rest of us would consider ourselves lucky to call her friend.”
—Theresa Brown, author of Critical Care:
A New Nurse Faces Death, Life and
Everything in Between and
New York Times opinion columnist
“Patricia Harman brings her own real-life experience as a midwife in Appalachia to the pages of The Midwife of Hope River, set in 1929–1930 West Virginia. I learned, I laughed, I cried, but most of all I was deeply impressed by the artistry of the midwife and her central role in women’s lives prior to the advent of commercialized, institutionalized medicine. This novel will live in my heart for years to come.”
—Amy Hill Hearth, author of Miss Dreamsville
and the Collier County Women’s Literary Society
“The Midwife of Hope River is a luminous novel of new beginnings, loss, love . . . and yes, hope! Patricia Harman’s all-too-human stories of birth mingle with the harsh realities of rural life in the 1930s. As an added bonus, there’s plenty here for those who loved All Creatures Great and Small! A thoroughly satisfying read by a talented storyteller.”
—Gay Courter, author of the New York Times bestsellers
The Midwife and The Midwife’s Advice
Credits
Cover design by Mumtaz Mustafa
Cover photographs: woman © by David Ridley/Arcangel Images; water © by Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
P.S.™ is a trademark of HarperCollins Publishers.
THE MIDWIFE OF HOPE RIVER. Copyright © 2012 by Patricia Harman. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks.
FIRST EDITION
ISBN 978-0-06-219889-1
Epub Edition © SEPTEMBER 2012 ISBN: 9780062198907
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