Objective: More women are planning home birth in the United States, although safety remains unclear. We examined outcomes that were associated with planned home compared with hospital births.
Study design: We conducted a retrospective cohort study of term singleton live births in 2008 in the United States. Deliveries were categorized by location: hospitals or intended home births. Neonatal outcomes were compared with the use of the χ(2) test and multivariable logistic regression.
Results: There were 2,081,753 births that met the study criteria. Of these, 12,039 births (0.58%) were planned home births. More planned home births had 5-minute Apgar score <4 (0.37%) compared with hospital births (0.24%; adjusted odds ratio, 1.87; 95% confidence interval, 1.36-2.58) and neonatal seizure (0.06% vs 0.02%, respectively; adjusted odds ratio, 3.08; 95% confidence interval, 1.44-6.58). Women with planned home birth had fewer interventions, including operative vaginal delivery and labor induction/augmentation.
Conclusion: Planned home births were associated with increased neonatal complications but fewer obstetric interventions. The trade-off between maternal preferences and neonatal outcomes should be weighed thoughtfully.
Keywords: neonatal outcome; planned home birth.
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