Episode Details

“Hospital Policy means the principles, rules, and guidelines adopted by the Hospital, which may be amended, changed, or superseded from time to time.”

Julie and Meagan break down hospital policies today, especially common ones you’ll hear when it comes to VBAC. They chat all about VBAC agreement forms and policies surrounding continuous fetal monitoring, induction, and epidurals. 

Women of Strength, hospital policies are not law. They vary drastically from hospital to hospital. Some are evidence-based. Some are convenience-based. Do your research now to make sure you are not surprised by policies you are not comfortable with during labor!

Defining Hospital Policy

Birth Rights Article

Needed Website

How to VBAC: The Ultimate Prep Course for Parents

Full Transcript under Episode Details 

Meagan: Welcome, everybody. We are going to be talking about policies today. What do they mean? Why are they created? And when do we have the right to say no or do we have the right to say no?

And I have Julie discussing this with me today. Hey. 

Julie: You know I’m a policy fighter. 

Meagan: Yes, we do. We do. The longer I have gone– in the beginning, I was not a policy fighter. I really wasn’t. I was a go-with-the-flow, sure, okay, let’s do it, you know best. That’s really how I was. 

Julie: A lot of people are. 

Meagan: That’s true. I think a lot of the time, it’s because we don’t know what our options are. We just don’t know, so I’m really excited to get into this with you today. 

I always love it because we kind of get into this spicy mood sometimes when we have topics like this that we are very passionate about. We are going to be talking about policies today. I do have a Review of the Week, and this is actually a very recent review which is so fun. We just posted on our social media for Google reviews. We were specifically looking for Google reviews and podcast reviews. 

These are so, so important for us but also for other people to find this platform. We want people to hear these stories. We want people to feel inspired and get educated and know their rights. Your reviews truly do matter, so if you have not yet, please, please, please do so. You can leave a review on your podcast platform, or you can go over to Google and just type in “The VBAC Link”, and then you can type in a review there. 

This reviewer is by Savannah, and she says, “I started listening to The VBAC Link Podcast around 16 weeks pregnant and continued throughout y pregnancy. It was so good and encouraging for me as a mama who was preparing for my VBAC. It helped me gain confidence, helped me know what to look for, and what to watch out for in my providers. Hearing others’ stories was so encouraging and helped me gain so much knowledge. I had my hospital VBAC unmedicated with my 8-pound, 15-ounce baby.” You guys, 8-pound, 15-ounce baby is a perfect-sized baby let me just say. 

“And I know that the knowledge I gained from this podcast played a huge role in being able to advocate for myself to get my birth o