Praise for the previous edition:

“…An outstanding handbook. It will be a familiar volume on most midwifery bookshelves, providing an excellent guide to midwifery focused care of both woman and child in the birthing setting.”
- Nursing Times Online

Providing a practical and comprehensive guide to midwifery care, The Midwife’s Labour and Birth Handbook continues to promote best practice and a safe, satisfying birthing experience with a focus on women-centred care.

Covering all aspects of care during labour and birth, from obstetric emergencies to the practicalities of perineal repair (including left-hand suturing), the fourth edition has been fully revised and updated to include:

• Full colour photographs of kneeling extended breech and footling breech births
• New water birth and breech water birth photographs
• Female genital mutilation
• Sepsis
• Group B streptococcus
• Care of the woman with diabetes /Neonatal hypoglycaemia
• Mental health
• Seeding/microbirthing

It also addresses important issues such as:

• Why are the numbers of UK women giving birth in stirrups RISING rather than falling?
• Why are so few preterm babies given bedside resuscitation with the cord intact?
• Would the creation of midwife breech practitioners/specialists enable more women to choose vaginal breech birth and is breech water birth safe?
• What is the legal position for women who choose to free birth – and their birth partners?
• Why are midwives challenging the OASI care bundle?

Incorporating research, evidence and anecdotal observations, The Midwife’s Labour and Birth Handbook remains an essential resource for both student midwives and experienced practising midwives.

VICKY CHAPMAN has worked as a midwife in a variety of hospital settings and as a caseload midwife and visiting lecturer. She has a particular interest in normal birth, as well as the politics of childbirth and their impact on women's birth experiences. Vicky has four children; three were born at home, including twins.

CATHY CHARLES is a midwife and ventouse practitioner, practising in acute and community settings. She has been a clinical audit/risk management co-ordinator, a visiting lecturer and a supervisor of midwives. She also teaches aquanatal classes.