HW 44 - Comments on Other People's Projects

To Devin,

Your project focused on the cutting of the umbilical cord, which includes, when to cut it (do doctors cut it too early).

The one aspect of this project that I truly valued was way you divided up the information at the beginning (anesthesia, convenience, and technology) although those were the shortest parts of your project I found them to be organized in a way where I enjoyed them the most.

The reason why this project matters to me is the fact that this could possibly affect my future decision when having a child. I am now definitely more likely to tell the doctor to wait a second before he cuts it. I will also be telling my friends (those who don't go to SOF) and family to check out this blog and to learn what i have.

The only suggestion I would make is to organize the second half a little better I felt it was a bit out of place although it was still a great project.


To Andy,

Your essay is a look into the cover-up that is in the movie The Business of Being Born. I found this essay to be very well written, this cover up is one I did not notice until you wrote about it. There is one specific line that I particularly found interesting which was where you analyze Muhlhahn’s interview, "Although Abby’s baby boy arrives safely, the physician says that Intrauterine Growth Restriction (IUGR) occurred. Do you want to talk about that? In the film it appears like the baby was starving, everybody missed it, and the doctor saved the day. But the situation was misconstrued because of a critical detail that was lost during the emergency transfer. The physician who received the transfer was under the impression that the baby was 40 weeks. Abby’s baby was actually born at 35 ½ weeks. A 3 lbs, 5 ounces baby at 40 weeks would have been much more serious than at 35 ½ weeks" I felt that here she began to make excuses almost as if deflecting the blame onto the viewer for not knowing this information. Doing research on my own I discovered the same thing as you. at 35.5 weeks a 3 Ib and 5 ounce baby is very small and way off the growth curve which makes me question some of the other information in the movie, not for any particular reason except for the fact Proxy-Connection: keep-alive
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at we were mislead here so there is a chance we were also mislead somewhere else.

Overall this paper was written very well. The only bit of constructive criticism is to start off the essay with a statistic rather than someone’s opinion because of the fact if someone not in our class who was reading this may be uninterested in Ina May’s opinion on the movie (since they don’t know who she is) however I think an interesting statistic on birth (specifically "Intra-Uterine Growth Restriction" (IUGR)) would be more compelling to a reader. Also the way you concluded the essay was especially good. The line “I also conclude that we must critically investigate the claims and evidence of ESPECIALLY the people we most agree with, in order to avoid entrapment in dishonest and/or oversimplified representations of our situation.” Is something I feel is important too; the best way to avoid a situation where someone else challenges you on your information is to challenge the information yourself.


To Abdul,

It seems that your project was a deeper look into the industrial nightmarish atrocities that surrounds pregnancy and birth.

One particular aspect I liked about your project was this look into both statistical information and historical information. This brings not only a general look onto the subject but also analyzes how we have evolved and how are opinions/practices have changed regarding the subject.

This project definitely matters to me, mainly because it has helped solidify the information I had learned in class. Knowing that a fellow classmate who has put hours of time into researching the subject discovered generally the same thing as the information we received in class allows me to be more confident in it.

The only suggestion I would make is to focus on a single aspect. It seemed that your project might have been a bit broad. Perhaps focusing on maybe cost, or historical information (although it seemed you mainly leaded towards cost) would have made this project a bit better. However this project was still well written and a joy to read. GREAT WORK!!

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From Andy:


Sharif,

Hilarious that you went to a college and interviewed those people and asked them those questions. Your interpersonal skills seem to have been working well, since you got them to talk at length on camera. Its easier when its two people, so they don't think you're a lone crazy.

You can hear for yourself here that the main problem with amateur film is the audio.

Why the baby picture at the end?


From Abdul:

For Sharif( Classmate):
Shairf it seems as though your post was about gathering information about people's understanding of birth. You really seemed passionate about this topic since you took the time out to venture out into the city and figure out what the common people knew regarding the topic. Since the common people are the majority of people in the city it's important that they understand birth and be knowledgeable about it.

One aspect of your post that I particularly valued was the fact that you used your connections(college now class id card) to get into Hunter College to find out what people who are seeking more knowledge, and are supposedly more educated than the average citizen know about birth. It's a very creative idea I don't think many more people thought of going to a decent college in the city and interviewing regular students, as well as pre-nursing students. Your elevator speech in class really made me want to go to your blog and watch these interviews.

A reason why I think your project matters is because the common people are the majority of people that are affected by birth. It's most important for them to be educated and knowledgeable about such an important aspect of life that many people involve themselves in. These people need to be prepared for for brith and I really think by you going to Hunter College and investigating people's opinions, you tried to really see what's in people's minds. Since were both enrolled in a Psychology class in Hunter, I think that helped with your drive to uncover what was in the Hunter student's heads.

I would have appreciated more from you on this topic.Although your blog was solid and much better than mines, I think if you would have maybe tried to educate people at Hunter more after you found out how little they knew. Perhaps posting fliers with some knowledge we learned from the unit on the bulletin boards on some of the floors, or just handing them out to students would have helped. If that wasn't possible you could have had sheets that told the Hunter students how to educated themselves better by having the names of the books we read this unit, or even the name of the movie we all watched. Clearly you didn't need to do any of this since your blog and elevator speech were solid, but there just suggestions. Nicely done Sharif I'm very proud of your work here.

From Ben:

For your project, I believe that you intended to explore how much knowledge people had on the topic of hospital births and what their impressions were. You explored to different hospitals to see how they handled birth, as well as interviewing multiple students at Hunter College.

This topic is extremely important to me, and it should be to everyone else as well. Understanding the procedures of hospitals is essential in the woman's decision to either have a hospital birth or go with a midwife instead. It is also important to be aware of the general public's understanding of a topic like this, so one can observe what knowledge people still need to acquire in order to take an educated stance on the matter.

I think you guys did an amazing job making that video! The fact that you were able to get all those students to talk to you for such a long time is impressive in itself, but your choice of questions in the interview provided very informative answers. The effort you put into this project was clear, and it showed through the observations you made in the hospitals.

It would have been nice if you had been able to get the necessary information out of the hospital staff, but nevertheless, great job!

HW 42 - Pregnancy & birth culminating project

Video Link Here ------->  http://vimeo.com/22095843



When brainstorming ideas for this project I initially wanted to do a film on the way hospitals handle their pregnant patients from c-section rates to how and when they use epidurals. However we decided that the topic was to broad and was honestly something you could look up online. I wanted this project to connect with the people watching it and mean something so I decided that the topic/main idea of the film would be what are perspectives of the common people and how is pregnancy and birth represented in hospitals. Lucas and I decided to visit Beth Israel hospital first the past Sunday, when we got there we noticed that at first they were friendly, the security guard obviously told us we couldn't go up but was gave us the number for the labor and delivery floor. We called up and were invited to talk with members of the staff. However when we got upstairs we began to start filming and were almost immediately avoided, the same people we were invited to talk to were told by a superior to completely avoid us stating that they were busy and had no time (when they clearly were not).

We decided that the next best move would be for us to go to Roosevelt hospital and see how they would react to us attempting to interview them. When we got there we were not allowed to film but they gave us a phone number that we could call to speak to the head nurse. We called multiple times but unfortunately we were never contacted back even after leaving several messages. When there we noticed that there were many similarities between Beth Israel and Roosevelt, for example they had the exact same logo (except for the name) we discovered this was because they were both owned by an umbrella corporation called Continuum Health Partners. We made the assumption that because they are both owned by this corporation that the procedures that they have when processing these pregnant women (funny how I said processing as if they were pieces of meat). However there were many differences, for example Roosevelt hospital seemed directed towards the wealthy with their private rooms and gourmet chefs (that's if you had the money) while Beth Israel seemed directed more at the common people because of the fact that it didn’t have that many luxuries.

Wednesday we went to Hunter College and decided to interview college students. We did this because college students are supposed to be the part of society that is constantly craving knowledge and to be the ones who already have an impressive amount of knowledge. We located a group of students first and found out that a majority of them were born c-section; we continued the interview only to find that their knowledge on the subject was similar to ours at the beginning of the unit. What is even more surprising is that 3 of them were pre-nursing students and were interested in going into the field of obstetrics and gynecology yet didn't know that much about it.

I felt that this project was very important to grasp a deeper understanding of the general’s public thoughts and knowledge of the subject. Although some knew more than others on the subject in general the knowledge on the subject was not so vast, which raises the question are we coming into this experience without the proper amount of knowledge making us unprepared for it? and Do we need to know about birth before going through the process? I think that we do go through this process unprepared and without the right amount of knowledge however I personally think we only need a little bit of knowledge on the subject because without a bit of knowledge we essentially allow the midwife or ob/gyn to make those decisions for us making them in charge of your process.

HW 41 - Independent Research

Topic: NYC hospitals and birth centers - statistics, contacts, perspectives

Annotated Biliography:

1. "New York Presbyterian Hospital - Columbia Presbyterian Center." Department of Health. New York State Department of Health , March 31 2011. Web. 31 Mar 2011. . (This source contains statistical information regarding New York Presbyterian hospital; this includes c-section rates, maternity and child death rates and more.)
2. "New York County Hospitals Maternity Information." Department of Health. New York Department of Health, February 2009. Web. 31 Mar 2011. . (This source contains statistical information regarding all main New York City hospitals, this includes c-section rates, maternity and child death rates and more.) 
3. "Birthing Center ." NY Womens health. Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center, New York , n.d. Web. 31 Mar 2011. . (This source contains information regarding A birthing  center located in Roosevelt hospital in manhattan, it includes information about what can be done medically in a birthing center and what a birthing center is.)
4. SULZBERGER , A. G. "Bellevue Natural-Birth Center, Haven for Poor Women, Closes ." New York Times November 6, 2009 : n. pag. Web. 31 Mar 2011. . (This source is an article from the New York Times which contains information regarding the bellevue natural birth center, this includes information about prices and personal accounts of having a birth in a birthing center.)
   
5. "Hospital Maternity-Related Procedures and Practices." Department of Health. New York State Department of Health, December 2010. Web. 31 Mar 2011. . (This source offers statistical infomration about c-sections in New York as well as informaiton regarding what hospitals have to legally tell you when you enter the hospital expecting to give birth.)

The articles i retrieved revolve around this idea of anti-hospital birth, giving you statistical information as well as perspectives on the different pros and cons (mostly cons). They cover a wide aspect of information, from the cesarean section rate in NYC larger hospitals to the amount of births there are in those hospitals. I found these articles to be extremely helpful when thinking about my topic because it helps solidify the information we are receiving in class through the book and the movie.

My project is hopefully going to be an inside look at hospital maternity care and the birthing process. I am hoping that i will be able to film my experience in a hospital and the way the hospital treats their pregnant patients, if im lucky i may be able to witness a real birth. Through this project i am hoping to get a real feeling of what these women have to go through when giving birth and whether or not the information that i am receiving through the book and movie is true.

HW 40 - Insights from Book - Part 3

You find yourself at a cocktail party (because yes your old enough to be at one) with the author of the book you just finished reading. You order yourself and apple martini and approach the bar where she is sitting alone. To demonstrate that you really read it, you say, "Hey - thanks for writing Birth. Your main idea of how the historical aspect of birth has had an effect on our perception of it today made me rethink pregnancy & birth for the better."

But the author looks up, surprised to be talking to someone who is clearly not old enough to be at a bar, but was more surprised to be talking to someone who instead of sharing their own birth story actually rephrased the main idea of the text she spent months giving birth to asks, "Really, which parts were most effective or important for you?" When you answer, "Well, in the last third of the book you focused on the father's role in birth and the post birth time period, which added another angle to the first 2/3rds of the book. But let me be more specific." And then you listed the top 3 ideas/pieces of evidence/insights/questions from that final third of the book (and somehow even listed page number references because your just that good). I especially appreciated how you discussed

1. The father's role during the birth and how it was no longer optional but their duty. (207)

2. What happens physically after birth (specifically what happens to the placenta). (220)

3. And the bonding process, both how important it is for the mother and child as it can lead to effect the relationship between the two.(228)

At this point, realizing that she's having a unique conversation with someone who is underage yet still incredibly handsome and also who is a serious reader of her book, the author asks - "But what could I have done to make this a better book - that would more effectively fulfill its mission?" You answer, "Well, let's be clear - your text sought to provide historical analysis, from the perspective of doctors and yourself for the book-reading-public to better understand pregnancy & birth in our culture. Given that aim,Proxy-Connection: keep-alive
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nd your book, the best advice I would give for a 2nd edition of the text would be, to add a more emotional aspect to your book, make the reader feel as if they are connecting to you and not just researching the history of birth although it is interesting it can also make a reader feel disconnected. But I don't want you to feel like I'm criticizing. I appreciate the immense amount of labor you dedicated to this important issue and particularly for making me think about The historical aspects of birth & the effect it has had on our perspectives . In fact, I'm likely to do my birth unit final project differently as a result of your book, now why don't you let me buy you a drink." The author replies, "Thanks! Talking to you gives me hope about our future as a society! and i will take that drink you incredibly good-looking and intelligent young man."

HW 39 - Insights from Book - Part 2

Cassidy, Tina. Birth The Surprising History of How We Are Born. New York: Grove Press, 2006. Press.

In Birth Tina Cassidy heavily discusses the historical aspects surrounding birth such as the tools, doctors and popular doctor practices. In "Business of Being Born" there is very little discussion about the historical aspect of birth specifically the tools used, The reason i find this to be important is because it poses the question can you truely understand the methods these doctors used to give birth without understanding what they used to engage these methods. The major insight the book attempts to to communicate is again, what are the historical aspects of birth and the process of giving birth. After learning about all the methods doctors would use to encourage childbirth i was astonished and astounded, some of these methods seemed very similar to torcher methods; the pumping of drugs, and the restraining of the pregnant mother with bed sheets. This major insight allowed me to pose the question how does this new information regarding the historical methods depicted in the book and the present methods depicted in the movie affect our interpretation of the birthing process? what can we see now that we were unable to see before.

1. Cesarean sections when preformed in other countries and the historical change in c-sections throughout time. (page 103)
2. The birth of the modern day doctor. How they came to be and how our view on them has changed and how they have changed. (131)
3. What tools do both midwives and doctors use throughout the birthing process, similarities and differences, pros-cons. (161)
4. Inductions, how it developed and how it has changed and become what it is today. (174)
5. Labor positions, which position is optimal and how has has labor positioning played an important role in birth (other than the obvious). Also how have different cultures used labor positions. (181)

A crucial factual claim that Tina Cassidy made was that around the 1960's Elizabeth Bing made child birthing education become a very popular and widely demanded topic to explore, i wanted to make sure this was true considering the fact that even today some people have trouble discussing birth with others let Proxy-Connection: keep-alive
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one letting others discuss birth with them.  Doing independent research i discovered that Tina Cassidy was right, although not very popular with the obstetricians Elizabeth Bing is a co-founder along with Marjorie Karmel of the Lamaze Child Birth Preparation Method in the USA and also was a major contributor for achieving "family centered maternity", on Ourbodiesourblog.org i discovered even more information, Its supports my factual claim and tells you even more about Elizabeth bing's incredible story, "Elisabeth Bing, co-founder of the Lamaze Childbirth Preparation Method in the USA almost 50 years ago, made a major contribution in achieving Family Centered Maternity and changed birth in America for the better  for all time. Birth in the 19th and 20th centuries went from the home to the hospital and was characterized by routine intervention with women being heavily drugged, restrained and isolated. By 1960, with co-founder Marjorie Karmel, Elisabeth Bing developed a grassroots movement with the support of only a few obstetricians, and showed that medical management was not necessarily safer." (http://www.ourbodiesourblog.org/blog/2009/04/lamaze-childbirth-preparation-method-elisabeth-bing) and for even more information regarding women and birth health stories visit http://www.ourbodiesourblog.org/blog/category/womens-health-heroes. However as convinvcing as this is it begs the question how can we be so interested and open about birth but be so scared and taboo when the topic of discussing of sex comes up, these two go hand in hand yet we don't treat them like they do?

HW 38 - Insights from pregnancy & birth book - part 1

The book is organized in more of a historical and statistical manor. The book does not give any sort of personal accounts from women who have gone through birth except for the occasional opinion of the author. the book is also organized efficiently, it seems as though the author is almost trying to cram information on each page. I think the main question the book is trying to answer is how birth and the activities surrounding it progressed throughout history. I feel that birth has become more of an industrial process instead of a natural one. It seems to me that birth has become less of a simple process because of the few occasions where birth can go wrong, instead of treating birth as a gift society views it as a disease and therefore treating it like one by using drugs and surgeries. The major insight the book attempts to communicate is that birth is a physical process originating from you and that it is important to be educated as to how birth and the birthing process has changed for the worse so that you can change it for the better. I feel as if the author is telling you about all the things that birth was before in a sort of angelic light not revealing the pain that may have also been present, for example on page 44 of the book Tina Cassidy discusses her opinion on the idea of hospitals and births while disguising it as a historical fact. She states that "There was a good reason for the medical establishment to accept nurse-midwives: as baby boomers began to reproduce, the birthrate outstripped the number of obstetricians- Meanwhile, women, empowered by the liberation movement, were looking for a kinder, gentler birth experience, one that did not invovle obstetricians or even hospitals." Tine Cassidy stated that hospitals and obstetricians were so-called "unkind and not gentle" which reflected her opinion on the topic very well. The 5 aspects that both the author and i agree on are

1. Education about the birthing process, we both agree that this is not well known and should be exposed so that women know the choice they are making.
2. Historical research regarding the topic, we both agree that to know what birth is truly like you need to know how it was before your own time.
3. More exposure to mid-wives as an alternative way to give birth, we both feel that this is Proxy-Connection: keep-alive
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   alternative option that some women should be able to choose and you can't choose it if you don't know about it.
4. Truth regarding "Hospital/Unnatural birth", we both feel that people should be informed about what hospital birth is really like and both the pros and the cons of it.
5. Truth regarding "Home/Natural birth", we both feel that people should be informed about what home birth is really like and both the pros and the cons of it as well. 

Tina Cassidy used almost exclusively historical evidence to support her insights and arguments. the sources of her evidence are unknown to me since she never quotes anyone in paticular. the evidence got communicated through her witty comments and insights. Honestly i feel that the author Tina Cassidy in her book Birth: The Surprising History of How we Are Born was being slightly one sided and kept mentioning how home and birth by mid-wives are the better option which im not saying is wrong but also i am not saying is right. I feel that if home/ birth by midwife was the better option with no cons then everyone would be doing that, i feel it would have been beneficial if she had explored the cons of home birthing further and exposed her readers to that so that they are able to make their own decisions instead of doing what Tina Cassidy tells them to do.

HW # 36 comments

To Arden- Arden i felt that this post was the best one yet. i could tell you put a lot of thought into it (and not just because it is so long). i felt your ideas were very developed and showed a deeper thought process that not a lot of people are capable of doing. My favorite line was "Turns out that those women who didn't know they were pregnant until labor described her perfectly. The signs were mostly all the same as she described to me, My periods were already irregular, I just didn't think about it much.There were not any out of the ordinary food cravings seen in other pregnancies. Then of course there is the baby's growth, normally noticeable. With no drastic changes M justified her weight gain to stress, lack of sleep." I felt like this line was particularly interesting because of the fact that it involves the both physical and mental change of women during pregnancy,but not only that you also explore women who are unaware they are pregnant and what the physical and mental change is like for them.

To Matt- Matt i felt your blog was very thoughtful yet still focused mainly on the interviews themselves. By putting your personal thoughts after rewriting the interviews you allowed me to draw my own ideas and conclusions without them being influenced by yours. my favorite part was when you said that "All of these women oddly experienced a newfound freedom in relation to feelings , their bodies, and relationships. Many felt they could move forward in life in a new direction . It seems these feelings with other experiences in birth are just components of a much larger process of birth. While generally considered powerful and profound, the particular meaning and significance of these feelings seems to be overtime fading." i felt that this showed the depth of your analysis and thinking. i also feel like you got a good piece of insight into the process of birth and the effects it can have on the mother's personal life, such as their relationships and freedom.

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From Mr.T (Mentor)- I found this to be your most interesting post of the ones I have read so far. Particularly, I thought your comment on the tenuous grasp of life at the moment of birth was very interesting.

The most striking part of the post - Proxy-Connection: keep-alive
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d the one I think you could expand - is the investigation of the female and male perspectives on the process of becoming a parent. There is an interesting dichotomy in the way your mother and father experienced your birth. It was smart of you to ask them the same questions. I wonder if their sentiments are more global. Do mothers and fathers feel this way in general? This would be an area of further study. Does the lack of the physical connection, as you point out, influence the father-to-be's perspective on the process of becoming a father? These are questions worthy of further study.

Keep up the good thoughts.

From Steven (protege)- I know that this is very general, and a broad idea, but my favorite idea in your writing was the "emotional connection". I have never thought about how there could be an emotion connection between something that everyone consider "alive" and something that only some people consider "Alive" (given that sometimes alive means breathing, and being held, and others where alive means being a fetus). This idea was very significant to me and specifically caught my attention, which is why it has inspired me to think deeper about it.

This topic is a little bit challenging for me to fully comprehend as i believe that you have to experience it to believe it. To really know the emotional relationship and connection, i think it is one of those subjects that cannot be explained. This has led to deeper thinking and the trying to understand the topic more thoroughly even though i percieve it to be impossible for me to fully comprehend at my age.

Overall, i think this was a great topic, and a great explanation of it, and it will defenitly leave me thinking.