Julie Roberts

Seeing the Baby, Doing Family: Commercial Ultrasound as Family Practice?

Medical sociologists and anthropologists have studied the social significance of obstetric ultrasound for families but little is known about how women and families make use of commercially available ultrasound scans. This article draws on interviews with women who booked a scan with a commercial company in the UK. For some women, commercial ultrasound can be understood as a family practice. We investigate this theme by examining who accompanies women to commercial scan appointments, how scan images are shared and how sonograms are used as prompts to resemblance talk. We argue that commercial scans are more than an additional opportunity to acquire ‘baby’s first picture’ and offer a flexible resource to do family, creating and affirming family relationships and rehearsing roles as parents, siblings and grandparents. Our findings confirm the importance of imagination in doing family and raise questions about the role of technology and commercial interests in shaping family practices.

Birth Plans: A Narrative Review of the Literature

OBJECTIVE: To describe and summarize the current body of evidence on the subject of birth plans to develop a research agenda. METHOD: A narrative review was undertaken to offer a comprehensive overview of themes emerging from previous research in this area. FINDINGS: Thirty-five papers from 33 studies were retrieved and grouped into three main themes: the impact of birth plans on obstetric outcomes, women’s experiences and opinions of completing and using birth plans, and health care professionals’ beliefs about and experiences of the use of birth plans. Key findings relate to beliefs about the benefits and challenges of birth plans, as described by women and health care professionals and the impact of birth plans on a range of obstetric outcomes. CONCLUSION: This review brings together a range of studies around birth plans and synthesizes key themes. Little homogeneity was seen in the studies identified, and a wide variety of care contexts and childbirth philosophies were represented. Findings suggest the need for further research into whether there are ideal circumstances and environments for the completion of birth plans antenatally and whether disparities between expectations described in women’s plans and experiences in labor and birth can be reduced.

Love Birth, Hate One Born Every Minute ? Birth Community Discourse Around Televised Childbirth

Childbirth is highly visible on television at a time when few people see birth in the family or community and access to antenatal education is declining. One Born Every Minute (OBEM) is the most high-profile example of this programming in the United Kingdom. Now on its ninth series, the series won a BAFTA in its first year and now exports programmes to the United States and France. However, such programming is controversial within the birth community. This chapter examines objections to the series—drawing on an analysis of published commentaries and opinion pieces from midwives, doulas and activists. Firstly we evaluate claims that televised birth promotes fear among women and damages the midwifery profession in the light of available research evidence. Secondly we explore the dominant conceptual questions that emerged from the analysis around the identity of OBEM as educational programming or entertainment, and its claims to represent reality. The birth community has raised important questions about birth on television and we draw together insights from a range of disciplines to argue for further research that is theoretically grounded to move the debate forward and tackle the complex question of how televised birth might be influencing women’s experiences of pregnancy and birth. The commentaries and opinion pieces from within the ‘birth community’ raise vital questions about the impact of televised childbirth on women’s experiences and on wider birth culture. However, some of the claims identified—that OBEM increases fear of birth, that it damages the profession of midwifery—need a stronger empirical basis if they are to be supported. We argue that interdisciplinary, theoretically informed research has potential to further the debate and inform interventions in popular culture.

“Babies come when they are ready”: Women’s experiences of resisting the medicalisation of prolonged pregnancy

Being pregnant beyond one’s estimated due date is a relatively common experience and requires complex decisions about whether to induce labour or wait for spontaneous onset. We report a qualitative study undertaken in the UK in 2016. We interviewed fifteen women and eleven more took part in an online focus group. Using thematic analysis, resistance to the medicalisation of prolonged pregnancy was identified as a strong theme. Drawing on the work of Armstrong and Murphy, we identify both conceptual and behavioural resistance in the accounts of women who accepted, delayed or declined induction of labour. Experiential knowledge played a key role in resistance, but women found this was devalued. Some healthcare staff used risk discourse to pressure women to comply with induction protocols but were unwilling to engage in discussion. The social context provided further pressure to produce a baby ‘on time’, with induction normalised as the way to manage prolonged pregnancy. Online spaces provided additional information and support for women to question the medicalisation of prolonged pregnancy. We end by considering the implications for policies of choice and agency in maternity care as well as the need for additional social support for women who are ‘overdue’.

Quantitative insights into televised birth: a content analysis of One Born Every Minute

ABSTRACT This article explores birth representations through a content analysis of two seasons of the U.K. program, One Born Every Minute (OBEM) (Channel 4, 2010–). Reality television (RTV) has been a fertile ground for the mediation of birth, but has also stoked controversy among feminist critics and the birth community about how birth is represented and the impacts this might have for women and society. International research has explored problematic over-representation of white, heterosexual couples, as well as noting a predominance of medicalized birth experiences. However, this research is formed largely of qualitative studies that are necessarily based on small samples of episodes. To contribute to this literature, we apply a quantitative and interdisciplinary lens through a content analysis of two seasons of the U.K. version of OBEM. Paying attention to the geographical and temporal context of OBEM, this article confirms over-representation of white, heterosexual couples and medicalized birth on RTV birth shows while also providing novel insights into the ambiguous representation of birthplace and lead caregivers, the medicalization of birth through the routinization of supposedly minor birth interventions, and the absence of the representation of women’s choice over such interventions.

10. ‘Wakey Wakey Baby’: Narrating Four-Dimensional (4D) Bonding Scans

Commercial companies market 4D ultrasound scans to expectant parents for the stated purpose of reassurance, to promote bonding, and to get ‘baby’s first picture’. This article describes in detail the process of commercial 4D scanning in the UK, paying particular attention to the discursive exchanges in the scan room. It is argued that sonographers and clients engage in a process of ‘collaborative coding’ that, despite the realism of 4D, is essential to making the imagery on the screen personally and socially meaningful. While sonographers first help clients to get their bearings, expectant parents and others often engage in a complex process of narrating the images on the screen as they are created. The capacities of 4D ultrasound to image facial features and movements inform stories about fetal experience and family resemblances as well as enabling playfully imagined interactions with the fetus. While these stories are primarily based in experiences of the visual, there is also evidence that pregnant women seek to map the image onto their bodies and to reintroduce some elements of their embodied experiences into the narratives.