How much does a home birth cost?
Let’s say that someone wants to have a nice comfy take home pay of $50k a year, and business costs are that much again, for a midwifery business (self employed, work from home office type thing). That’s $100k turnover that needs to happen. A midwife might opt to take 1 or maybe two births per month, and offer antenatal visits and follow up visits, as well as the birth, so that’s 24 clients a year. So if a midwife charges less than $4,200 per birth, how does she earn money and run a business?
I’m not saying that this is a reasonable cost - I actually think that birth should be free (backed by Medicare and/or health insurance if needs be) and really, at the moment, if it were a choice between paying that kind of money for a homebirth or birthing for free in a hospital, I know which I’d have to choose.
Oh you noticed that the baby bonus and the rough cost of a home birth are similar? How unusual! What precisely is the baby bonus for? Is it for the best birth possible? A new TV? More time at home with bub, for either/both parents? An upgraded car? No one seems to know for sure. If you have to pay upfront for the services of a homebirth midwife, then the baby bonus would seem a long time coming. I personally would not work for money afterwards as costs would start from day 1, and there would potentially be the situation where payment was withheld due to a less than perfect outcome, despite services having been rendered.
If you ask around in Sydney, apparently these costs are about right. Travel may or may not be included, and personally I can see why it would be extra on top of that. But in Adelaide, it’s not that expensive and that means only on thing - midwives aren’t charging enough. Midwives seem to follow a calling to this field and there’s an expectation that they do it for love, not money. Some women are reluctant to put a price on their time as well, and feel strange charging for their services.
It brings to mind the discussions I was having a while ago in a different circle about crafts (knitting and soapmaking come to mind) where the crafters are mostly female, and mostly reluctant to charge for their products. The difference I guess is that while handmade soap, or handknitted scarves, are expensive for a reason, substitutes exist that people can delude themselves about as being adequate.
Midwife-assisted births on the other hand, can’t be substituted for without you noticing.
Homebirth in Canberra is about $3000 for one midwife, but she only takes about 4-6 clients a year, or $4500-5000 for the only other midwife I’ve found. That second dedicated lady services a whopping chunk of NSW as well as the ACT and is actually based in Goulburn. Doulas are around $900. According to the lady at work who has chosen to go private *shudder* the obstetrician alone will be costing her about $3000, not sure if she gets charged extra for any anaesthetic or not. Of course, you might be one of the small number of women lucky enough to find out about your pregnancy early enough to get a place in the birth centre, but even then there is a fairly high chance you’ll end up in the ward anyway if there is any sign of something that might possibly maybe be a complication
*sigh* birth is a natural process, why do people not understand this any more?
Comment by Ness — December 14, 2006 @ 8:52 pm
We had an independent midwife for a homebirth in 2000. She took on 4 birthing women a month and charged $1600 for her services (a little extra for the hire of a birthing pool). This also covered the cost of her insurance which i understand is no longer available. The baby bonus was $700 then. I don’t know how much prices have changed since 2000 and not sure how independant midwives’ expenses would be $50000 but it was certainly a reasonable price to pay for the fantastic care provided in the comfort of my home and i imagine just over $70000 a year, including a month off, is pretty reasonable too. With maternity units closing all over the place and hospital policies based on fear of litigation rather than trust in a natural process, i would encourage everyone to access midwives who will attend homebirths. Hopefully our government will follow and start providing what is surely best practice for free.
Comment by SallyAnn — November 21, 2007 @ 12:48 pm
I was extremely surprised by how reasonable the cost of our independent midwife was for the birth of my youngest in Dec last year- $2,300(in Adelaide). I know my midwife has put her rate up now, but overall really I felt she was doing herself a disservice by charging so little.
That said we were fortunate that she was- since my husband had gone back to study, and we were living off Austudy, so it was a very pleasant surprise when we realised with the help of the baby bonus we could have a homebirth.
Comment by Anya — March 24, 2008 @ 9:11 pm
I am an independent midwife in NZ. Here, we work for payment from the govt of approx $2000 per woman including antenatal, delivery and postnatal modules. There is no cost to the woman in this. I take four women a month, and work about twelve hours a week plus births. My “business costs” are less than $900 a month. so less than one womans costs, and approx $10,000 a year would more than cover it! This includes clinic room, supplies, phone and petrol. A home birth costs me personally about $400 more than a hospital birth, mainly due to the cost of paying a second midwife to attend. just to help you in the figuring out of the “costs” of running a midwifery clinic, it is nowhere close to $50000.
Comment by Anna — April 10, 2008 @ 3:01 pm