Pregnancy

Families Fight to Keep North Shore Birth Center Open

As Beth Israel Lahey Health started to close the center, births are being transferred over to Beverly Hospital, but patients say they are looking for a natural birth setting, and home births aren't covered by insurance

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Families are trying to keep the North Shore Birth Center in Beverly, Massachusetts, open.

The center, which is on the Beverly Hospital campus, It's one of the few options for women who are looking to have a natural birth.

"Just two years ago exactly I was able to birth her at the North Shore Birth Center," Brittany Conant explained of her firstborn. She was expecting to do the same with her next addition to the family in five weeks - looking forward to a natural birth in a non-hospital setting.

"There are pain management tools like a deep standing pool that I could give a natural unmedicated birth that is not being provided at the hospital," she said.

As Beth Israel Lahey Health started to close the center, births are being transferred over to Beverly Hospital. Conant said the hospital setting is not equivalent.           

She was among the families and midwives demonstrating outside Beverly Hospital Thursday. They want at the very least to let current patients deliver at the center.

"I have been in tears nearly every appointment comparing the sterile environment of the hospital versus the nurturing and warm presence of the birth center," one woman attested at the event.

The center opened four decades ago and is the only freestanding midwifery-led birth center in the eastern part of the state. Many other patients said other centers are too far away, and insurance doesn't cover home births.

The hospital has said a lack of midwives was forcing the shutdown.

“We are committed to fostering a safe, high-quality maternal healthcare environment. Beverly Hospital continues to work in partnership with elected officials and our local community to further discuss the complex challenges associated with safely operating the NSBC," Tom Sands, president of Beverly Hospital, wrote in a statement.

The birth center was originally slated for closure at the beginning of September. At the beginning of August, the hospital said it would pause for 90 days to reassess.

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