Americans throughout the country are waking up to the possibility that the medical industry might not always have their best interest in mind, and surgeon Dr. Marty Makary is one of the men leading the charge.
Now, he’s sounding the alarm on the way women are treated while giving birth in the hospital and what it means for the future of their children.
“We’ve seen the group think and medicine downplay these best practices in childbirth that we now recognize have dramatic benefits,” Makary tells Allie Beth Stuckey of “Relatable.”
“A delayed clamping of the umbilical cord once the baby is born. That umbilical cord is pulsating healthy stem cells and fetal hemoglobin which binds oxygen really well, and it’s warm blood infused directly into the child’s circulation to keep the baby warm,” he explains.
However, as a medical student, Makary was taught to immediately cut the umbilical cord, the second the baby came out. Those in the medical industry are also taught to whisk the baby away from his mother after just minutes — but skin-to-skin contact for hours after birth leaves the baby with a normal heart rate and blood pressure, and the baby is less likely to need an ICU stay.
The baby also has a normal glucose level, because when the mom holds the baby, the stress hormones are not spiking as high, which changes glucose levels.
Not only does he take issue with those common practices, but he relays to Stuckey that C-sections and antibiotics are often unnecessary.
“Sixty percent of antibiotics are unnecessary, and an estimated 40% of C-sections are unnecessary,” he tells Stuckey. “Mothers are unfairly, inappropriately told there’s no difference. You can deliver vaginally or by C-section, your choice.”
However, the microbiome in the gut forms differently when the baby is born by C-section versus vaginally.
“The gut of a baby in utero is sterile. There’s no bacteria in there. How do we get our millions of different bacteria that live in this harmony and then are involved in digestion and immunity and mental health? Well, a baby passes through the birth canal and the bacteria of the vaginal canal seeds the microbiome, augmented by bacteria from breast milk, especially in the first hour from skin contact,” he explains.
Babies born by C-section also have higher rates of asthma, inflammatory bowel disease, colitis, Crohn’s disease, irritable bowel syndrome — and there may even be a connection between people born via C-section and higher rates of colon cancer.
“If you as a doctor tell a woman in labor anywhere in the world, a C-section might be safer for your baby, then 100% of women are going to say, ‘Well then do it, right now,’ right? It’s manipulation if it’s not based on good scientific data,” Makary explains.
Stuckey had C-sections with her first two births and delivered her last one vaginally.
“I was definitely, with my first birth, one of those people that was pressured in all different kinds of ways,” Stuckey says, adding, “They dropped the, ‘Oh, maybe you’ll have a stillborn baby thing.’ Which, there was no indication of that at all. She was perfectly healthy.”
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