Is Your Provider VBAC Supportive?
How do you go about choosing a VBAC provider? Will they be tolerant or actually supportive of your choice(s)? What is the difference between providers and locations, and why does it even matter?
VBAC Supportive Provider
A provider who is VBAC supportive will want you to have a safe outcome. They will work with you, in partnership, throughout your pregnancy in order to help facilitate a VBAC. They will work with you to stack the deck for a VBAC and encourage you to stay on track for a low-risk birth.
Most providers will understand that a multifaceted approach will be necessary to support a TOLAC (trial of labor after cesarean). This will include good nutrition, exercise, proper body mechanics, stress reduction, and sometimes the assistance of alternative care providers.
During labor their policy may be:
- Relatively flexible on the length of gestation as long as there are no other concerns.
- Open to induction or augmentation of labor if medically appropriate.
- Understanding that each labor and baby will have its own unique labor, and as long as the MotherBaby dyad is doing well, labor doesn’t need to have time limits.
- Encouraging laboring at home in early labor as long as it is safe.
Their practice and birth location will:
- Have a low primary cesarean rate and a high VBAC rate.
- Supports both VBAC and VBA2C.
- Can promise that their whole team is equally supportive of VBAC, in case your preferred provider is not on call.
Terms:
TOLC- Trial of Labor After Cesarean
VBAC- Vaginal Birth After Cesarean
VBA2C- Vaginal Birth After 2 Cesareans
CBAC- Cesarean Birth After Cesarean
Image credit: Video: https://youtu.be/eJDztNGJ3Eg