Natural Birth

Betty Ras

Betty is a Dutch midwife with 20 years of experience in home- , hospital- and water births. From 1995 till 2003 she was also teaching midwives at the Midwifery school of Amsterdam.
She has been living and working in NZ for 6 years and her and her family all like the Kiwi life very much!

Milena Lehmann

Milena was born in Germany and has lived in NZ with her kiwi partner for 5 years now. She has studied Midwifery at Auckland University of Technology. She has worked with midwives in Whangarei, Kerikeri and Kaitaia. In her free time she likes to go surfing and to walk her dogs.

What we offer

-We offer total maternity care from 6 weeks pregnancy till 6 weeks after birth,
-Our antenatal clinic is in a quiet, private environment in Kerikeri
-We have regular information evenings for couples to prepare for labour and birth
-We do home births, water births, births at the birthing unit of Bay of Islands hospital for all women who are low risk for birth
-We support women with a medium risk for birth in Whangarei hospital
-We can give you a lot of information about other services available e.g. yoga, homeopathy, massage etc.
-We do post natal visits till 6 weeks after birth at your own home.

How we work:

We are 2 independent midwives and we both believe that birth is a very special, but natural occurrence in a woman’s life.
Working in a partnership with women and their family, having 2 midwives available, we can ensure that we give you continuity of care and the attention you need. We will inform and support you, empowering you to make your own decisions and to achieve the best birth outcome with the minimum of interventions.
Of course the safety of you and your baby is our top priority.

Working as your Lead Maternity Carers we are responsible for coordinating your whole care, including referrals for blood tests, scans and prescribing some pregnancy related medication, only if necessary. We can also refer you for consultation with an obstetrician if there is any indication.
For any pregnancy related condition or any concern, we are your first point of contact.

You can book your first visit with us after 6 weeks pregnancy, it’s not necessary to visit your GP before. Till 28 weeks of pregnancy, visits will be scheduled on a monthly basis, then fortnightly until 36 weeks and weekly until birth.
At every visit we check your blood pressure and monitor your baby’s growth and heart rate. We’ll do routine blood tests at least twice in pregnancy and if you wish you can have an ultrasound scan around your 20th week of pregnancy.
We will spend a lot of time giving you information and answering all your important questions.
When you go into labour, one of us will be with you for the duration of the labour and birth and for at least 2 hours after birth.
We will monitor you and your baby frequently, helping you to relax and to find your best position to give birth.
We check your baby and help you to latch baby on soon after birth.

After your delivery, we normally visit you daily to get used to the changes happening in your life and establish feeding. These visits will reduce gradually as you get your own routine going and your baby is growing.
Six weeks after birth your care will be hand back to your own doctor and Well Child Carer of your choice i.e. Plunket, Public Health or Hauora Whanui.
Of course we hope you will let us know if there is any cultural or religious consideration that needs to be addressed and do not hesitate to tell us when you are not satisfied with your care. We are very open for your opinion.

When we finish your care, we will hand out 2 review forms which are very important feedback for us to improve our service.

Last year’s results:

We cared for 6 women a month averagely, we supported more then 50 percent births at home (national average is 5 percent). All our women have chosen their own birthing position, none of them delivered at her back. All our newborns had an Apger scores above 8, we had no inductions with intravenous syntocinon, we had no instrumental deliveries and no episiotomy?s.
Our Caesarian Section rate was 15 percent (nationally 25 percent), Ninety percent of our first time mothers had a beautiful vaginal birth.
All our women experienced enough information and felt safe and well supported.
More than 90 percent were happy with the total care and found it suited them.