Women's Health Risks Associated with Orthodox Medicine — Part 1

Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients,  Jan, 2002  by Gary Null,  Debora Rasio,  Martin Feldman

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During the past century, a medical establishment has evolved that has positioned itself as the exclusive provider of so-called scientific, evidence-based therapies. For the first 70 years of the 20th century, little effort was made to challenge the establishment's paradigm, which we call the orthodox medical approach. In the past 30 years, however, there has been a growing awareness of the importance of an alternative approach to medical care, one that, either on its own or as a complement to orthodox medicine, emphasizes nontoxic and noninvasive treatments and prevention.

Unfortunately, this new perspective has been fought vigorously We've been told that it is only the treatments of orthodox medicine that have passed careful scientific scrutiny involving double-blind placebo-controlled studies. We've also been told that alternative or complementary health care does not have any science to back it up, only anecdotal evidence. These two ideas have led to the widely accepted "truths" that anyone offering an alternative or complementary approach is depriving patients of the proven benefits of safe and effective care, and that people not only do not get well with alternative care but actually are endangered by it.

With this report, we question the status quo in one area of orthodox medicine: practices related to women's health. Our review of the medical literature shows that the safety and effectiveness of many orthodox treatments cannot be assumed. We present dozens of research summaries which reveal that conventional treatments may not deliver the expected benefits or may be associated with an increased risk of various health disorders.

This review will be presented in three parts, covering topics ranging from the use of oral contraceptives to surgical practices such as hysterectomies and cesarean sections. In Part 1, we focus on prenatal care, fetal heart monitoring, home versus hospital deliveries, and breast-feeding versus formula feeding.

Note that all of the studies included in this report come from mainstream medicine's own respected journals, such as the Journal of the American Medical Association and The Lancet. There is nothing subjective or political about the conclusions drawn here. The criticism of various therapies in this series comes not from the "alternative" world but from the very heart of orthodox medicine itself.

The journal articles speak for themselves. We are a society that claims to live by the gold standard of scientific research, but this report shows that statement to be at odds with reality. It shows that we routinely cause iatrogenic conditions and unnecessary suffering -- as well as waste vast sums of money -- through a systemic negligence of the facts. This situation must be challenged and remedied.

Prenatal Care

If you assume that more prenatal care equals better pregnancy outcomes, the following research reports may come as a surprise. Several studies have found that fewer prenatal visits to the doctor or fewer medical procedures resulted in similar or better outcomes than more visits or more care. (1-2)

Other studies show that routine ultrasound screening of low-risk women does not translate to improved health in newborns. (3-4) And when it comes to detecting cases of Down's syndrome, traditional screening by ultrasound and maternal age is just as effective as the more costly method of blood serum screening. (5)

The results of this study, conducted on over 57,000 women, show that those who received the most amount of prenatal care by their physicians had the worst pregnancy outcomes and the highest rate of cesarean sections and induced labor.

-- Gissler M, Hemminki E, Amount of antenatal care and infant outcome. Eur J Obstet Gynecol Reprod Biol 1994 Jul; 56(1):9-14.

The results of this study show that the introduction of a new program of prenatal care consisting of an average of 2.7 fewer than usual prenatal visits was associated with maternal and infant outcomes that were similar to those of women receiving standard number of prenatal visits.

-- McDuffie RS Jr, Beck A, Bischoff K, Cross J, Orleans M, Effect of frequency of prenatal care visits on perinatal outcome among low-risk women. A randomized controlled trial. JAMA 1996 Mar 20; 275(11):847-51.

This randomized study, conducted on approximately 16,000 women in Zimbabwe, evaluated the effects of a new prenatal program for pregnant women consisting of fewer physician visits (an average of 4 instead of 6 visits), and fewer medical procedures per visit, on maternal and infant outcomes. Women who received less prenatal visits and less medical procedures had significantly lower risk of delivering preterm babies and of experiencing severe hypertension and eclampsia. Other outcomes were similar in the two groups.

-- Munjanja SP, Lindmark G, Nystrom L, Randomised controlled trial of a reduced-visits programme of antenatal care in Harare, Zimbabwe. Lancet 1996. Aug 10; 348(9024):364-9.

The results of this study show that routine ultrasound screening during pregnancy is not associated with improved newborn health. The study was conducted on 15,151 low-risk pregnant women randomized into two groups. Women in the first group received two ultrasound tests during their pregnancy, those in the second group received an ultrasound scan only if their doctor saw a specific medical need for the exam. No differences in perinatal outcome were detected between the two groups, indicating that routine ultrasound screening in low-risk women may increase health care costs without improving the health of women and their newborns.