Bill would allow midwives to attend home births

The Health and Human Services Committee heard testimony Feb. 22 on a bill that would remove the state’s prohibition on a certified nurse midwife attending a home birth.

LB712, sponsored by Malcolm Sen. Ken Haar, would retain the requirement that a certified nurse midwife operate under the supervision of a licensed practitioner who would have to authorize a home birth.

Haar said many women feel as though giving birth at a hospital is done at the convenience of doctors and would like the opportunity to be attended by a midwife at home.

“There are only two states in the country that don’t allow this – they are Alabama and Nebraska,” he said. “I believe that we’ve criminalized something that should be the choice of a family.”

Rachel Gilligan Howell of Nebraska Friends of Midwives testified in support of the bill. Current law does not prevent home birth, she said, but it does prevent midwives from making home births safer.

“One hundred babies were born at home last year in our state,” Gilligan Howell said, “all without the assistance of a licensed care provider.”

Karen Loll of Lincoln also testified in support of the bill, saying she chose to have her third child at home, unattended. Loll said she felt “like a prisoner” when her first two children were born at the hospital and that the process was uncomfortable.

“I didn’t want my child born into a building filled with sick people,” she said.

Certified nurse midwife Rebecca Wells also supported the bill, saying many women feel alienated by the experience of giving birth in a hospital and want a less intrusive, less expensive alternative.

“It’s a matter of risks and benefits,” Wells said. “For women who are low risk [and] who are proper candidates for home birth … facility costs can be avoided.”

Joann Schafer, director of the division of public health, testified in opposition to the bill. The state Department of Health and Human Services consistently has opposed allowing certified nurse midwives to attend home births based on available research, she said.

“The bottom line is that there has been no compelling evidence submitted to the department, or that we’ve found, that would change our position on this bill,” Schafer said.

The committee took no immediate action on LB712.