Health education for women is an essential component of antenatal care. It is necessary to provide support programmes such as childbirth preparation classes for mothers and couples, relaxation training programmes led by nurses and psycho-education for women with fear of pain or anxiety.
Clinical interventions such as vaginal birth after C-section and vaginal breech delivery in appropriately selected women could reduce the frequency of C-sections, according to the Lancet series.
The series concludes that the wide variations reported between regions and within countries, and between women, show that caesarean use is not evidence-based. The series also finds that an increase in obesity, age and nulliparity (the condition in a woman of never having given birth) among populations of women are not enough to explain the upsurge of surgery-aided births.
However, the series concludes that efforts to reduce C-section births must strongly respect women’s right to choose the circumstances of birth.