A study of maternal mortality and midwifery on the Isle of Man, 1882 to 1961

Extract

The living conditions and the health of Manx mothers continued to improve from 1881 to 1961. Against this background they were at first delivered conservatively and mostly by midwives. During this conservative phase the proportion of mothers surviving childbirth increased as their health improved: by the quinquennium 1907–1911 the maternal mortality rate on the Island was half what it had been twenty years earlier. Between 1912 and 1927 maternal mortality rose and during the quinquennium 1922–1926 the MD/BR was again at the level it had been thirty years before. Some of the maternal deaths during the quinquennium were among women who were subjected to intervention during childbirth by doctors in the unfavourable surroundings of their homes; conditions more suited to delivery by the conservative methods of kindly and patient handywomen. Following the opening of a small maternity home on 6 May 1927 the family doctors began to send their difficult deliveries into the Home where they were looked after by skilled staff and delivered in a well–equipped labour room. Throughout the subsequent decade the MD/BR remained at a level below that in 1907–1911.