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More Midwives May Soon Be Practicing in Manhattan if Bill Passes

By DNAinfo Staff on June 18, 2010 11:52am  | Updated on June 18, 2010 2:03pm

A bill that is currently in the state legislature would allow New York midwives to deliver babies without a written partnership agreement with a doctor.
A bill that is currently in the state legislature would allow New York midwives to deliver babies without a written partnership agreement with a doctor.
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Flickr/Lab2112

By Olivia Scheck

DNAinfo Reporter/Producer

MANHATTAN — More midwives may soon be able to practice in Manhattan – but only if a bill, currently in the state legislature, can get past a physician advocacy group.

Members of the New York wing of the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (District II) spoke out on Thursday against the legislation, which would allow midwives to deliver babies without first obtaining a "written partnership agreement" with a doctor or hospital.

While the bill would apply to all of New York State, its passage would have special significance for midwives who lost their partnerships with the closing of St. Vincent's Hospital last April.

Joan Bryson, 60, has been a midwife for 20 years but, since the closing of Greenwich Village's beloved Catholic hospital, she's had no luck finding a doctor or hospital willing to take on her home-birthing practice.

"We sent out letters to every single hospital in New York and beyond," Bryson said, referring to her fellow home-birth midwives, who had also been partnered with St. Vincent's. "We got hit the hardest."

Now, Bryson said she's "banking on the bill going through."

But Donna Montalto, Executive Director of the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, District II, insisted that such a loosening of regulations would put birthing women at risk.

“These written agreements exist for a reason," Montalto said in Thursday's statement. "If a midwife is faced with a high-risk birth, the agreement ensures that an ob-gyn will be contacted immediately so the patient receives the best possible care.”

Laura Sheperis, President of the New York State Association of Licensed Midwives, disagreed.

"The irony is that the written practice agreement is not an insurance policy," Sheperis claimed. "It doesn't ensure that there will be someone available 24/7."

Instead, Sheperis said that adequate midwife training is what "really ensures patient safety,"

"We are educated and trained to handle all of the normal and also many of the abnormal things that come up."